Where the West Wind Blows
by Evil Is A Relative Term
Summary: Time has passed for the Inu-tachi after the sealing of the well, trapping Kagome in the feudal era. Now in service to Sesshomaru's mother, Kagome meets them all again as unrest in the north draws them back together
1. The Lady of a Thousand Autumns

Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended.

A/N: Revised, expanded, and otherwise beautified for the new year.

Time has passed for the Inu-tachi after the sealing of the well, trapping Kagome in the feudal era. Now in service to Sesshomaru's mother, Kagome meets them all again as unrest in the north draws them back together.

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter One-

The Lady of a Thousand Autumns

_It ended with a simple phrase: "I wish to make an unselfish wish." The paradox of making a unselfish wish, an action by its nature selfish, marked the end of a campaign that had defined Higurashi Kagome's childhood. But it was also a beginning of a new journey. Such is the cyclical nature of all life. _

_-_from the _Records of Spirit and Flesh_, chapters on the Jewel of Four Souls

There is a conceit unique to the young and the foolish; only they may believe that there are things untouchable by time. Everyone else, through bitter experience, became accustomed to the truth that even feelings cannot remain unchanged. Especially in the face of drastically altered circumstance. For months after the Jewel was destroyed, Kagome had been blind to the changes in the people around her-living with the reality of Kikyo should have taught her a great deal about that kind of willful blindness, but it was a trait born of optimism and not self-interest, which meant it was a thing easily forgiven by friends and eagerly utilized by enemies.

But three years had given her time and perspective. It was with fondness she looked back at that golden time, but she knew the changes were all for her friends' happiness and she was the last person on the planet who would begrudge them that well-deserved emotion. It was almost as if the Jewel had been their great metaphor: disparate pieces gathered for a greater purpose and when that had been fulfilled, they melted away like dew at dawn.

No one had said goodbye.

No one had felt the need to. It had seemed, to each of them, Kagome included, that the separation would be brief. For a week, for a season, but then that season had turned into a year, then that year had given birth to the new one, and then was born again. Three years. Short and long, all at once, strange as only the human perception of time can be.

Shippou had learned by leaps and bounds on their journey, but his battle tricks couldn't replace the systematic education that his father could no longer give him. Modern parents sent their children to boarding school, so it wasn't like Kagome was a stranger to the idea. And, perhaps also like modern parents, Kagome had forgotten how quickly children adapted-soon his journeys back to the village grew shorter, the intervals between his appearances longer. And when she'd left the village, they'd all but stopped altogether.

Sango, freed from her long and tormented journey to avenge her village, had one day decided to take a purifying journey, to look at the world with new eyes. She'd ended that journey after two seasons in the same place where her story had begun, in the destroyed village of slayers. But she hadn't been alone. This was the Warring States era. Orphans were a fact of life. But Sango had seen in these some promise or perhaps some reflection of herself. Kagome had been there to help raise the first buildings. She wondered, upon occasion, what it was like now.

Miroku always wrote to her about it in his letters, but the letters were few and far between and his visits to Sango's village even rarer. Sango wasn't the only one suddenly free of the burdens of her past. Without the Wind Tunnel, Miroku had found he was younger than he'd thought and far more curious. He'd gone back into training and traveling, though he'd written that he and Sango had a ritual: when he came to call, he always told her in utmost seriousness that she had an evil aura hovering about her house.

Inuyasha had remained Inuyasha, but it was his fault that Kagome had left the village. It was a thought couched in fondness and more than a little humor, for she doubted Inuyasha could have predicted in a thousand years what had happened.

Youkai were strange and capricious creatures. Kagome simply hadn't known how capricious until a faction of inuyoukai with nothing but trouble on their minds had taken it into their claws to press for recognition of Inuyasha as a legitimate heir to the dearly departed Inutaisho.

"No way in hell," had been his none-too-delicate response to that, but no one had asked Inuyasha. After all, they weren't actually interested in sullying the family tree of their illustrious general. What they were interested in was alleviating the inevitable boredom that came along with near immortality. At least, she would come to find, such political maneuvers were rare-inu generally left that sort of dirty, sly thing to the neko.

But appropriate gestures had to be made, the procedures followed. Inuyasha had marched off, full of ire and more than a few poorly chosen words to be heard before his brother, in his incarnation as Lord of the West. Given that Sesshomaru had no mate, Kagome had been left to appear before the Lady of the West in the Court of the Moon.

She just hadn't realized, at the time, that she wouldn't be leaving said Court again.

Chiaki-sama had been fascinated by her. It was not the reaction Kagome-or much of anyone else-had expected. "Both my son and former mate seem entranced by mortals. What is it that makes you so interesting?" she had demanded. Kagome would learn that while some questions might seem rhetorical, Chiaki-sama generally expected answers when she asked a question, even one as baffling as this.

First came the delays to her departure. Chiaki-sama had insisted on being told of all her adventures, in what Kagome thought was excruciating detail. The thoroughly modern girl had thought they might need to amputate her legs at the knees from long hours of sitting seiza in front of the lady's great dias. At the end of the three day visit that had stretched to a week, when Kagome had been prepared to tender her goodbyes, the inu had announced, easy as you please, "You will stay with me for a season."

Kagome had stuttered out a reply into to dissuade without offending. "Surely your ladyship wouldn't want to keep an untrained _human _miko in your august court."

Her concern wasn't only because she had no desire to continue on in the nerve-wracking environment of Chiaki-sama's court. Though that was a primary concern. Kagome had almost reached her limit on condescending comments. But there was a more personal reason-one she hadn't even discussed with Inuyasha, because Kagome wasn't certain he would understand. Being a youkai, it was in his nature to chase after power.

Kagome was no stranger to the need for power, either. She'd certainly developed enough self-esteem issues when comparing herself to Kikyou. But there was such a thing as too much power. Especially when you had youkai friends and your particular brand of power was purification-purification that now surged and ebbed like some great tide almost beyond her control. Some days were worse than others. On good days, everything proceeded much as it had for the first three years she'd spent in the past. On bad days, purification crackled like static electricity between her and any youkai who drew too near.

Kagome wasn't optimistic enough to hope that Chiaki-sama hadn't noticed her uncontrollable power spikes. She _was_ optimistic enough to hope that it would be a very good reason for the lady to send her home.

She was also wrong.

In a gesture eerily reminiscent of her son, a silver brow had risen imperiously. "I will make arrangements for your training. You will stay, until I discover what is so appealing about humans."

"But why…?"

"You are less offensive than any ningen I have yet smelled. You will be suitable."

It was an answer only an inu could give and expect to be taken seriously.

Kagome was fairly certain she could be given a hundred years and three tutors and she still wouldn't find inu culture anything less than bizarre. Whereas curiosity was generally regarded as a childish attitude in everyday life in modern culture, especially the kind of over-bearing and invasive curiosity the inu practiced, not only was it accepted in inu-youkai culture, it was actively encouraged and _cultivated _among the long-lived creatures.

This, unfortunately, did not bode well for Kagome's future freedom, as their casual curiosity might well last for the rest of her life. But she had come to the Court of the Moon in an official diplomatic position. If Chiaki-sama wanted to make her a permanent attachment to her entourage, Inuyasha didn't have enough political sway to stop her. And in order to keep head and body of her best friend together, Kagome had managed to convince him that storming the castle in the clouds with its elite guards was not a good course of action.

And so she had become Chiaki-sama's miko, a designation more literal than a free-minded modern was really comfortable with. While Sesshomaru was the occasionally contested ruler of the Western Fortress and its attached lands, Chiaki-sama was undisputed alpha of her estate. The advantage of a floating castle, Kagome supposed, was that you really could throw people you disliked over the edge of the world.

Everything and everyone within _belonged _to Chiaki-sama. None of her retainers had done more than raise a few well-groomed brows at their lady's pronouncement. She'd thought sourly that they might be curious as well, given the infamous nature of the Inu no Taisho's choice of concubine.

But it was a reciprocal relationship-for undivided loyalty and obedience, Chiaki-sama made certain her subordinates were well provided for. In one of her innumerable pronouncements, she'd set aside an unused garden and pavilion for Kagome's use. Later, she would find both garden and pavilion had a colorful history, belonging as they had to the favorite concubine of the previous occupant, who Chiaki-sama had dispatched handily when she'd left her husband's estate in a snit when he first came home smelling of human in places that couldn't be explained even by his glib tongue.

This particular Court of the Moon had a very short history by youkai standards, being less than a century old, but the line of the Moon itself was old and distinguished. It was explained to her later that this castle could technically be more accurately called the "Lesser Court of the Moon," the "Greater Court of the Moon" being ruled by Chiaki-sama's older brother from a castle somewhere to the north, which by description Kagome couldn't tell if it was _on_ a mountain or it _was_ a mountain.

Then they destroyed both garden and most of the pavilion and built a shrine in the expansive courtyard they had created. Chiaki-sama had looked on with satisfaction, having sent envoys to the famous shrines to investigate the architecture. When Kagome had tentatively asked her which kami she intended to enshrine, Chiaki-sama had huffed. "As if I would invite a god to live in my house. Make do."

Kagome, baffled, because it was counter-intuitive to the whole of Shinto make a shrine without a god, had been left with little option to continue as she'd been doing. Which was trailing in Chiaki-sama's wake.

Chiaki-sama was as good as her word-practitioners of every faith, from the length and breadth of Japan, suddenly found themselves apt to be "borrowed" for a few sessions. Luckily, the journey into the clouds and back was surreal enough and short enough most dismissed it as a dream or vision. Or the people they told looked on it as a spiritual journey full of metaphor, rather than a "ningen-napping" as the progressively more amused guards began referring to it.

She was aggressively non-discriminating, though it might be more accurate to say that Chiaki-sama, being one of the beings they were debating about, cared very little for the trappings of human religion. And she was aggressively, intrusively curious about seeing spiritual powers in action.

It was she, in fact, who insisted on Kagome's first shiki, after an unlucky practitioner of onmyou had tried to subdue one of the servants.

Which brought her to the present, more or less, if she ignored the strange happenings that just seemed to dog her. Pun intended.

-X-X-X-

Kinakihiko, better known to Chiaki-the-Great-and-Heinous-Bitch as shikigami no. 2 and to Call-Me-Kagome-sama as Aki, bore his mistress' muttering with his characteristic good humor. There were not many dogs who could pull the wool over the eyes of a kitsune as old and powerful as he, but the old bitch had certainly gotten him good.

Unlike the inu, he didn't suffer from overweening pride: when offered the choice between suffering the indignity of being a miko's servant or an indeterminate sentence with Chiaki-sama's pet torturers and courtiers, he'd opted for the human. She, at least, had an expiration date, something not always guaranteed with the tetchy inu, who didn't take thievery lightly, even when it was only as a joke, from one daiyoukai to another. Surely having eight tails should grant him some leniency; but no, there were only the lady's words: "It only means you are old enough to know better. I should increase your sentence for rank stupidity."

So had Kinakihiko met Higurashi Kagome, the girl who'd been less interested in him and more interested in watching Chiaki-sama warily. He'd approved immediately. His soon-to-be-mistress had been taller than the usual human female, though not so tall as a youkai, lending her a certain air of vulnerability that was increased by her slender mortal body.

It was all a blatant lie.

What she was was a vast reservoir of power, hidden poorly once the unfortunate youkai made contact with her skin. As Aki had been kneeling at the time, courteously aiding her in subduing himself in a kind of formal play (Chiaki-sama was attempting to standardize the process of collecting voluntary shiki, they would find out later, with metaphoric attempts to escape and rote lines-if there wasn't a ceremony for it, the lady could and would invent one) there hadn't been far to fall, but he was still tempted as her first, accidental touch sent lightning arcing across his skin.

She'd winced as well, almost fumbling the elegant jade beads Chiaki-sama had provided for the occasion. But over his head the double strands had went and the binding had proceeded apace. Aki had needn't an actual conversation with Chiaki-sama to anticipate the "more fool you" tone she would take, so he hadn't even bothered. Until about a week later, when he couldn't take it anymore.

It went exactly as anticipated.

Aki consoled himself with the thought that in thirty years he'd have his ninth tail. Then, perhaps, he could went his freedom from Kagome-sama. He'd made it his business to ingratiate himself with his new mistress, which wasn't terribly difficult. If Kagome-sama didn't have the dormant power to erase a citadel from the map, she would have been eaten long ago.

She was just so terribly _nice_, though of late she'd grown a backbone, probably a defense mechanism to the damn pushy inu that populated the Court of the Moon. But she still chronically underutilized her shiki-if anything, there were times when he was fit to perish of boredom. She didn't have enough demands for one servant, let alone three. But three she had, until it pleased Chiaki-sama to make another prisoner. Not that Seiichi or Karakurenai seemed to have the same sensitivity he possessed.

Though Nai-chan did get to leave the Court more often-as he was absent now. Not that he wanted much to do with the vicious, sharp-toothed oni, but still, if he had to suffer, they should all suffer alike.

Kagome's snarling finally brought Aki's attention back to his mistress. "I should cut it just to spite her," she was grumbling as she flicked the long strands of dark hair irritably over her shoulder. Aki chuckled, ire dissipating. Slipping a comb from his sleeves, he deftly pulled her hair back and secured it in the traditional low tail of a Shinto miko.

Then, because he knew it would exasperate her, he made Kagome-sama stand with her arms outstretched, so that he could make certain her costume was unwrinkled, with the folds falling as they should. When she'd first come to the Court of the Moon, Kagome-sama had possessed a strange aversion to the clothes of her calling, but little things like that had never stood in the way of Chiaki-sama's will for long.

When he was satisfied, he smiled at Kagome-sama as she inspected her appearance in a small, round mirror. "You look very pretty," he told her. The compliment, as usual, left her unmoved. She'd flushed at every small kindness for weeks, but after three years, Aki had to do something truly outrageous to make her blush.

"I should cut it just to spite her," Kagome snarled beneath her breath. "We aren't living in the Heian period anymore."  
>Aki, who had actually lived through the Heian period and found it fairly amusing, nodded mock-gravely. Once Kagome-sama had exhausted her complaints about her hair, she strode across the room and slid open the screen, opening it to the winter waiting outside. Just the sight of the snow blanketing the ground made him wish for a warm brazier, hot drinks, and small games indoors. But Kagome-sama, despite being far more prone to take cold than her youkai servants, was of a hardy, outdoors sort of disposition. Or, at least, she was prone to an outdoors disposition when inclement weather drove the more courtly youkai inside with fewer distractions.<p>

Aki pulled the waiting fur from atop the chest of Kagome-sama's clothes, draping the heavy bear pelt across her shoulders, her dark hair blending perfectly into the shining fur. If he hadn't been there himself when she killed it, he would have sworn it was a demon from the size of the pelt, which had made not only the cloak she now wore, but also thick gauntlets and fur-edged boots.

Now Kagome-sama came at last to the real reason for her preoccupation with the state of her hair: worry. "Chiaki-sama usually has the inu youkai patrol during the winter. I hope nothing is wrong. This summons sounded unusual."

"I doubt even the kami themselves know _that_ female's mind," Aki replied, though he too was curious. "Perhaps it is only a whim of Chiaki-sama's temper." It was one of the few allowances she made to the mortal frailty none were quite certain Kagome now possessed, a respite from her normal duties during the harshest months of winter. Once one accumulated so much reiki that it became imperative to spend it in endeavors like subduing shiki and still having enough left over to purify a platoon with a single arrow, _human _was a term in some dispute.

Kagome-sama didn't look convinced. "Sei-san, have you heard anything?"

Her first shiki looked up from where he'd been kneeling outside the door, quite at ease in the cold. Seiichi was the son of an old enemy, now dead, who nonetheless had posed some risk to Chiaki-sama's interests. But a consideration for how he might serve her in the future had kept him among the living, just as that same foresight had saved Aki. Both shiki shared another thing in common-they were tremendously powerful, but neither had land nor retainers to protest, if Chiaki-sama usurped their freedom. It had been a trend only broken by Karakurenai, better known as Nai-chan, whom Kagome had subdued for her own protection-the oni had been trying to eat her at the time.

Sei's look of thoughtful consideration emphasized the fine, pearlescent patterns of scales still visible on the edge of his eyes and the back of his hands. His coloration, which included crystalline blue hair that ended abruptly before it touched his shoulders, with the exception of two floor length sections that were probably the manifestation of his whiskers, made him seem at home in the weather. Aki shivered as the dragon thought. Eventually, he said, "There have been rumors of disturbances to the north, but I have heard nothing specific. If something has happened, Chiaki-sama is keeping it close."

Aki shivered again, this time with something other than the cold. The north was the domain of the dragons. Any trouble coming from that direction would be something serious-if he had his choice, they would spent the duration of the disturbance far to the south. By far and large, the ryuu were peaceful and philosophical, born of the rains of spring, summer, and autumn. But the dragons of winter were fierce and ambitious enough to account for all their brethren. With breath like a blizzard and a heart to match, Aki would as soon spent a summer with the sly neko to the south or the eternally warring wolves of the east.

Kitsune were far too intelligent to bother with interference in the politics of their youkai brethren. They preferred to meddle in the affairs of the weak-minded and short-lived humans.

While he was considering the implications of the northern troubles, Sei had risen in a strangely boneless movement, ready to accompany Kagome-sama.

With a sigh, his mistress began the journey along the covered halls, her expression carefully neutral. Several times, they were stopped by courtiers who'd heard of her summons and perhaps the same rumors, but Kagome-sama was too wise now to offer them incomplete information or news she didn't have Chiaki-sama's leave to spread.

The guards outside Chiaki-sama's current room of residence nodded greetings as Kagome knelt before the doors and was granted admittance.

It was a small room, Aki's quick eyes saw, the doors to the garden outside left open, the flowers there in full bloom, as if it was high spring, but encased in a delicate layer of ice. A large square brazier kept the room temperature steady, the orientation of the room sheltering it from the winter winds. The great dog herself was seemingly paying great attention to the flowers outside, but the slight tilt of her lips downward indicated more serious thoughts.

But then Aki was obliged to sit with his eyes cast down, being the lowest of the low-shiki to a human. Even when said human was the court spiritual advisor, bizarre as that situation would seem.

-X-X-X-

Kagome could almost hear Aki's complaints in her head, which was a dangerous situation when she needed her full attention to devote to Chiaki-sama and her demands. The eight-tails vacillated between being hilariously funny and almost unbearably whiny. Now, she loved Shippou with all her heart, but she was beginning to think it was a species trait. It was no wonder that most of the stories that had survived into her time pictured them as females. Compared to the much rougher ideal of manhood that survived in this era, they were almost effeminate. And definitely childish.

"How may this humble miko please this great one?" she asked after she had tendered the requisite bow to her alpha.

She was a little surprised when Chiaki-sama didn't answer immediately. As an immortal youkai with inordinate wealth and the almost slavish devotion of a whole host of retainers, she still despised waste, whether it was of resources or time, but she could be surprisingly generous. Chiaki-sama was a whole host of contradictions: she despised the subtle political games of the neko, but she could play them as well or better than her enemies, she disliked humans but was tempted by their ability for innovation, she could in one moment be a warrior unmatched by any but her own offspring, the next be the kind of noble who spent decades arranging her gardens to her pleasure.

There was only one thing not in doubt; Chiaki-sama was most pleased when she was confusing people.

Her jumble of convoluted thought dissipated when the lady fixed her with a stare that still reminded her eerily of Sesshomaru. "Your contact with your pack, it has been rather sparse, yes?"

Kagome bowed her head, confused. "Your orders, Chiaki-sama." _I will not have half the world trampling through my court, _had been her exact words when her friends had petitioned to visit her.

"Yes, my orders. I was surprised when you didn't rebel against them." Unlike Sesshomaru, Chiaki-sama didn't often address herself using the formal third-person. When she did, everyone tried to be very far from the bloodbath that would ensue. It helped that her court was generally composed only of trusted retainers—guests of high rank were few and far between. If Chiaki-sama wanted to see someone, she generally imposed on them, not the other way around.

"We have all been very busy," Kagome replied carefully. Not to mention actually locating half of her companions to deliver the letters took half a season. Inuyasha's letters were left at Edo in the care of Kaede, but the dog never bothered to write back. Miroku sent some rather polite but usually very informative letters every few months. Sango, for all her skill with any weapon that found its way into her hand, was barely literate and Kagome always felt bad when she imagined the proud headwoman struggling through a letter written with the modern idioms and characters that hadn't quite disappeared from her writing, no matter how good she'd been at classical Japanese in school. So Kagome usually asked Miroku to deliver her news to Sango, solving both the communication problem and doing her own not-so-subtle matchmaking in one fell swoop.

Though she wouldn't live to see it, Kagome was looking forward to the invention of the telephone. And commuter trains. If there'd been trains when they'd been looking for the Shikon, the quest might have taken a few weeks instead of years.

"Hn. No matter. You have enjoyed your time in my court?"

Kagome regarded the question warily, like one might a spider or snake. It sounded like a leading question. Chiaki-sama had shown no indication of being bored with Kagome, but it was hard to tell. "Yes, majesty."

"I was pleased with your ceremony for a good harvest. Very entertaining." Chiaki-sama's teeth were very white, despite the lack of modern dental care. Good, strong teeth for ripping out the hearts of her enemies, Kagome supposed.

She bowed her head again. "This miko is very glad to have offered this small service, majesty." For while Chiaki-sama might be allowed to drop polite speech in her own court, Kagome had seen newcomers punished for the presumption. She was uncertain how many years she needed to be in the youkai's court before she became one of the ornaments. Kagome rather hoped not to be here long enough to find out. Though it wasn't like she was a bird trapped in a cage here—in the warmer months, Kagome typically found herself "patrolling" the inuyoukai's territory, though she had yet to discover what she was patrolling it _for. _

Mostly she went around doing standard miko duties. Benevolence and aid to the sick and suffering, ceremonies to invoke rain in times of drought, purification of especially destructive youkai. The last sometimes gave her the impression that Chiaki was using her as some kind of miko assassin for trouble-making youkai, but Kagome hadn't been able to let her reservations about Chiaki-sama's motives stop her from helping the people whose homes, lands, and lives were being destroyed by the demons.

And despite being Tokyo-born and bred, Kagome had some useful tricks up her sleeve when it came to farming and irrigation that had earned her praise as a kind of low-grade land kami from the humans she imparted them to. She thanked the kami for television and all those science classes she'd had to suffer through, just as she reassured herself that she wasn't changing the timeline, because everything she'd done here had already happened in her future. And it wasn't like she was teaching them genetic manipulation or anything. Just helpful hints here and there.

"You will be glad to know you will be seeing your pack again. I have heard they have gathered in Edo. Apparently, that child that my son is so fond of has somehow gotten herself involved with Ryuryo's troubles up north."

"Was Rin-chan harmed, majesty?" Kagome asked urgently.

"I do not know. My mate's other brat has claimed that territory as his own and does not bother to send me news." And if she didn't know better, Kagome thought Chiaki was actually a little miffed by that.

"What is your majesty's desire of this respectful miko?" It would be uncharacteristic of Chiaki-sama to send aid, even if Sesshomaru was involved.

She was not disappointed. "You will go and observe. You may interfere if you cannot help yourself, but it would be best if you do not help my son. Who has tried to kill you on several occasions, which you should keep in mind if he is foolish enough to find himself in need of your aid."

It was no wonder, Kagome thought wryly, that Sesshomaru had grown up to be 'The Killing Perfection.' With a dam like Chiaki, his only other option would have been to be 'The Dead Failure.'

"This one will leave immediately," Kagome said with another low bow. Chiaki-sama's castle wasn't exactly accessible, but if she rode Sei she could be in Edo in no time at all. And frozen half-to-death, but that was the cost of quick travel in the winter. Unless…

"Kuroren will accompany you. He will also brief you on the exact nature of the troubles in the north on the way."

And there it was. Kagome, despite having lived in the Warring States period for six years, still didn't have quite enough knowledge about medieval military structure in general and Chiaki-sama's forces in specific to really understand what function Kuroren performed in Chiaki-sama's army, except that it was a leadership position, but not _the _leadership position. If Chiaki-sama didn't fill that herself, that function belonged to Hideyoshi, who was best not spoken of.

Even though Kagome had both her shiki and the more than rudimentary training that Chiaki-sama had forced on her, she had become a political figure after her first year, spiritual advisor to the lady. Kagome herself still wasn't certain what she did as court spiritual advisor, unless the aforementioned duties counted, but she was apparently important enough to rank a bodyguard.

And Kuroren was inevitably that guard. Which was probably another sign of Chiaki-sama's sense of humor in play, for a single, very important reason: Kuroren could have been Naraku's body double. Youkai were handsome, in general. When Aki wasn't whining, he was downright charming with his laughing green-gold eyes, acrobat's physique and long red-gold hair that he wore back in a braid. Sei was equally as stunning, though he looked less human than the others, and he was endearing in his own quiet way. And if you could look past some really terrible habits to Nai's exterior, he was also very handsome, in a masculine, kill-you-as-as-soon-as-speak-to-you way, complete with the distinctive hair that had earned him his name and curling ram's horns in shining black.

In specific, Kuroren ranked up there with Inu no Taisho's sons (Or, if she were more honest, Sesshomaru, because Inuyasha had always been less pretty and more rugged. She had not fallen in love with his looks or his mouth. Except his ears. She had fallen hard for those ears and she sometimes wondered what that said about her own proclivities.). If Naraku had been a full-blooded inuyoukai and was a great deal less psychotic and a great deal more snuggly, they could have been dead ringers for each other.

In her three years at the Court of the Moon, she had learned more than she'd ever wanted to about inu youkai culture. She had learned, for example, that the reason Chiaki despised Inuyasha's mother was not for the straightforward reason that the Inu no Taishou had slept with her. That, as disturbing as it was, though not unusual by medieval standards, was par the course for inu, though unlike among humans it was a more equal opportunity situation. Chiaki had no room to speak, having her own catamites, though she'd been a great deal more subtle about it, because well-bred inu did not flaunt their conquests, unless said conquest happened to be an enemy general. But the enormous breach of inu etiquette was that he'd pupped her, a privilege reserved for the alpha female. In fact, among inu, it would have been physically impossible for Inu no Taisho to breed any of the females besides his chosen mate. It simply didn't happen and his breeding with a human, no less, had been nothing short of the gravest kind of insult.

It was the equivalent of Chiaki slaughtering Sesshomaru-a rejection of everything their mate-bond was supposed to represent. It had inspired the most bitter of Chiaki-isms: "A dog will be loyal to his master but not his mate."  
>Kagome still wrestled with indecision over how she should feel about this situation. A modern girl, her first instinct was to sympathize with Chiaki-sama. The level of bitterness that still lingered beneath her humor seemed an indication that she'd had deep feelings for her deceased mate, though Chiaki would have been a woman difficult to love. And, even if Inu no Taisho hadn't returned those feelings, he should have known the proud and powerful lady wouldn't react well to being publicly shamed. In fact, Kagome was really starting to doubt Inu no Taisho's sanity: a man who would cross both Chiaki-sama and Sesshomaru, even for love, would have had to be more than a little crazy.<p>

And though she felt bad for Izayoi, there was every indication that she'd known she was becoming an adulteress: even if she'd been ignorant of youkai culture, human culture also condemned the actions she was taking.

But her thoughts on the matter could chase themselves in circles for hours. Of more immediate relevance among inu youkai cultural peculiarities were the non-sexual skinship practices. Sesshomaru, with his aversion to touch, was apparently a glaring exception in inu culture. Part some inborn disgust, part exceptional power that he hadn't had such control over when young, and part, Kagome suspected, some complex over his father, everyone agreed that Sesshomaru was peculiar in the way that great men are peculiar and no one thought much about it.

Everyone else snuggled, cuddled, and generally touched in a way that would made any Japanese feel oppressed. Especially when sleeping. It was a practice that had probably followed them from their chill caves somewhere in the distant past, but it was uncommon to find an inu who slept alone by choice. It was usually reserved as a kind of low-level psychological punishment.

Kuroren thought of lending her his body heat as an act of kindness, even if she was too deaf to appreciate the comforting beat of his heart. The first time she'd awoke to hell-red eyes, Kagome thought she'd fallen into a nightmare. And he just watched her with placid, terribly _inu _eyes as she stumbled over herself in trying to explain why she'd prefer he stay at a comfortable distance.

It made no difference.

It did not help that Aki, usually useful in such situations of cultural misunderstandings, found the whole thing deeply hilarious. And Sei was no help at all. And consulting Nai? Not even to be considered. Oni regularly ate their young. Any cultural divide that broad wasn't going to be crossed, let alone be used as a bridge.

So it became a standing joke in court that Kuroren was the Miko's General.

In a court where white inu prevailed and their accompanying colors of white, silver, and red were seen everywhere, his black and purple colors were distinctive. And unlike Sesshomaru or Chiaki-sama, his poison was not acidic, but was somnolent. Mild poisoning caused nightmares that were hard to wake from and fatigue that could last for days, extreme poisoning actually put the victim into such a deep state of rest that their heart stopped.

"Bring me back interesting stories, miko." Chiaki-sama said by way of dismissal.

Kagome made sure her steps were measured as she and her companions returned to her pavilion, because running in the castle was frowned upon, but she fumbled with eagerness to be gone as she gathered her weapons. Across the room, Sei and Aki argued quietly over the contents of her saddlebags. She frowned at Aki until he finally capitulated and packed only things suitable for travel. The showy kitsune would have had her traveling like some sort of kept woman, if he had his way.

Kagome's fingers followed the familiar curve of the great black bow Chiaki-sama had awarded her, with its string of dragon gut. Several lashed bundles of arrows always sat at the ready, the bow still her primary weapon, and Kagome donned a full quiver with the distinctive paint stripes and notches that marked the arrows as hers. Kuroren, in one of his strange acts of goodwill, had taken it upon himself to acquaint her with swordsmanship, but to say Kagome's interest was limited was being kind. Her opponents were generally youkai and male, giving them every advantage of strength and long practice. Her method of long-distance warfare was a better match than her dismal sword skills could ever be. And as for close-range combat, she'd learned a trick or two with her over-abundant purification powers, though she still had to be very, very careful that no allies were nearby, because that sizzling white light did not discriminate.

It took them only about fifteen minutes to gather her things. They had, after all, been doing this for years now. Almost as long, she thought suddenly, as she had traveled with her friends.

As a testament to Kuroren's familiarity with her schedule, he appeared only minutes after they'd finished packing, though Aki was still arguing for the inclusion of some oddment or the other and Sei was refusing to carry it. "Are you prepared to depart, Higurashi-sama?" he inquired. As usual, he was dressed in his quilted traveling armor and tall boots, wavy hair falling loose down his back, katana hanging at his side. His specialization was spear combat, but just as in the human world, polearms were looked upon as being somehow lower than swords. It also made for awkward traveling.

"Yes," Kagome replied, quashing the small war as Sei smiled smugly at Aki.

Kuroren held something out to her. "Chiaki-sama thought to make provision for your journey." She confirmed that Chiaki-sama had provided Kuroren with her seal and a purse, which came as little surprise. No more 'ominous clouds' for Kagome. No, though she spent most of her nights sleeping beneath the stars, if she had need of say, a band of mercenaries or a small estate, Chiaki-sama provided plenty of human currency. Kagome tried not to think too hard on how such great piles of the stuff were collected.

_I'll see you soon, Inuyasha, _she thought as Sei transformed in her personal courtyard, careful to avoid the shrine at the center.


	2. The Court at the Well

Disclaimer: Like all (or, well, most) fanfiction authors, I will one day write a best-selling, world-renowned series. Unfortunately, it was not this one.

A/N: First chapter was revised, so I'd request you all take a moment and look over it again. Thanks for reading!

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter Two-

The Court at the Well

Kagome buried her nose deeper into Kuroren's hair, quietly appreciating his clean, earthy scent from the dried grasses and herbs that he used to stuff his futon. "The only fur I will sleep in is my own," he'd told her when she inquired why he disdained the more readily available skins and pelts that were the results of an almost fully carnivorous court. It would only be later that she would discover that the same held true for most of the higher members of the courts; the lingering scents upon the furs worked to partially conceal their personal scents, which among many of the canine youkai was instantly to be equated with deception. Hence, the light herbal scents that hovered above the muskier personal scents of the youkai.

But more than his scent, Kagome greedily leeched the inu's body heat. A strange sound, somewhere between a bark and a cough, came from her left and she recognized it as Aki's laugh in his fox form. Unlike the inu, who grew larger with age, the kitsune added only tails and power, his eight-tailed form little bigger than a horse.

"We will be arriving at the Bone Eater's Well soon, Higarashi-sama."

Kagome didn't know how he could tell, but it didn't seem troubling enough to get her nose frostbitten for. So she mumbled her thanks into his back, trusting to his demonic hearing. And, as he promised, Sei soon began his spiraling descent. As they drew closer, she could also hear Inuyasha shouting, so she thought dryly that they'd certainly ended up at the right place.

"What the fuck is a dragon doing here? Is this your fault, Sesshomaru?"

And his brother's steely reply, "This is none of my doing, whelp."

Kagome awkwardly dismounted the dragon before they could begin throwing attacks, nearly tumbling from Sei's back in her hurry. Kuroren silently righted her, but Kagome brushed passed him before the combination of the dragon and the Naraku-clone really sealed the deal for Inuyasha, who was firmly in the ask questions later camp. Hands firmly on hips, she gave him _the look_. The one that had always meant the magic word was soon to follow. And even after three years, it appeared that memory still blazed bright and strong. "So, you can teach an old dog new tricks," Kagome said with mingled humor and satisfaction.

"Kagome?" Inuyasha was open-mouthed and her companions hardly less so. The pole-axed look Inuyasha wore only grew worse as Aki landed and transformed in a swirl of youki, grumbling all the while under his breath about inconsiderate rulers.

Aki's keen eyes, the gold striations more prevalent than ever, caught on Inuyasha like he was superglue. Kagome sighed, anticipating where this was going. "So this is the bastard whelp of the Inu no Taisho."

Inuyasha puffed up like he was a bullfrog determined to defend his lilypad. "And who the hell are you?"

Kagome clapped her hands, sending the conversation to a screeching halt. "Akii~," she said warningly, to which her ever-loyal slave replied with a winning _Who, me?_ look.

Speaking of wide-eyed hero worship, Shippou was eyeing Aki's tails like they were-well, actually Kagome didn't have a good enough metaphor to describe the way he was looking at the older kitsune.

"Kuroren," Sesshomaru said darkly.

"Sesshomaru-sama," Kuroren replied, inclining his head just so.

Inuyasha darted a glance between them. "You know each other?"

Sesshomaru tilted his head to one side. "This Sesshomaru is not personally acquainted with him. He is this one's mother's."

Kuroren's expression did not change. "I am currently at Kagome-sama's pleasure." Miroku's expression did.

Sputtering and trying to turn it into an innocent cough, he asked, "Ah, Kagome-sama, I meant to greet you when you arrived, but I did not realize you would descend from heaven with such splendor."

"Haha," Kagome said dryly. "Well, my entourage aside, I heard Rin-chan was in trouble." And she hadn't spotted her in the clearing.

Inuyasha snorted, but it was in the same tone he always used when using his gruffness to conceal his concern. "Kaede's looking after her. Kid had a scare, that's all."

Sesshomaru looked like he disagreed, but he said nothing to Inuyasha. "You've come as my respected mother's spy?"

"Hey! What do you think you're accusing her of?"

"Inuyasha!" Kagome snapped. She sighed. "I'd hope three years might have given you some maturity. I see I was mistaken. And he's right."

Inuyasha blinked. "He is?"

Kagome nodded. "Chiaki-sama sent me to observe."

Miroku processed this more quickly than the others. "And your companions?"

"Here to render aid and keep me from trouble," she said, rolling her eyes. Inuyasha, however, seemed to glance at the black inu with a new measure of respect, for which she was tempted to _sit _him.

But while he hadn't matured in any other appreciable way, he did seem to pick up on that thought, because he scoffed again. "Your entourage is as big as Sesshomaru's," he grumbled. "We're going to turn into a traveling circus at this rate."

Kagome glanced around the clearing. "Sango isn't here?" she asked curiously.

"She sent word that she was delayed," Miroku replied. "But, Kagome-sama, how did you know we had agreed to meet here, today?"

That was an excellent question. But only Chiaki-sama knew the answer and the likelihood she would share that knowledge was roughly the same as, say, Inuyasha understanding quantum physics. "Lucky guess?" she said with a laugh, instead. "But, that begs that question, Miroku-why didn't you write me to start with?"

An incriminating glance was turned towards Inuyasha, who scowled. "Don't look at me like that. The last time you went anywhere on your own, you never came back. And since the big bitch in the sky won't let me anywhere near her castle, you would've had to come on your own. There was no telling what kind of trouble you would've gotten into."

That was fair, if not flattering, so she let it pass without comment. Miroku, with the dexterity of a seasoned courtier, redirected the conversation. He faltered for only a moment as Sei transformed, shallowly nodding in acknowledgement of the others. "Ah, perhaps it might be appropriate to introduce your companions?"

"Oh," Kagome flushed. That was an embarrassing misstep. "This is Kuroren-san, who as Sesshomaru pointed out, is part of Chiaki-sama's armed forces. Aki," and Aki bowed with a flourish, "and Sei," another shallow nod, "are my companions." Companions was a nice euphemism, much better than shiki, which translated somewhat literally into servant or slave.

The Inu-tachi also took the time to introduce itself, though Sesshomaru abstained. Which was just as well, because within the inu youkai sphere of influence, Sesshomaru introducing himself was redundant. _Everyone _knew who he was. For better or worse.

"So," Kagome asked, "are we going to wait for Sango?"

Miroku shook his head. "We intended to travel to her village. Kirara carried the request, so it probably isn't an attack, but we wanted to be certain all was well there."

Kagome unobtrusively eyed Sesshomaru for any signs of impatience at this plan, but it was like trying to interpret a rock wall. "Sounds like a plan to me," Kagome declared.

"So you're coming with us?" Shippou asked eagerly.

"Well, I certainly didn't come all this way just to say hello and leave again. Chiaki-sama, for reasons of her own, wants an observer into the situation in the north. So, I won't be leaving again until this is resolved."

Miroku nodded. Shippou cheered. And Inuyasha, vocal as ever, said, "Keh, just don't slow us down."

Before they left, she did look in on Rin, but the girl-now growing into a woman-was sleeping peacefully, so she backed out of the hut. She was startled when she almost came crashing into Sesshomaru, his amber eyes watching her with suspicion. _Chiaki-sama could have cloned herself, _Kagome thought with astonishment. She'd looked at Sesshomaru before, but when Sesshomaru was present, life-threatening danger tended to accompany him, so she'd had a kind of larger-than-life image of Inuyasha's elder brother without remembering many of the details of his appearance.

"This one has been told you have officially entered the court of this one's honored mother," Sesshomaru intoned. Somehow, he managed to make the innocuous statement sound like a threat.

"Yes," Kagome agreed cautiously.

"This one's honored mother has her own interests in mind-but certain they do not come to a cross purpose to Rin's."

Kagome scoffed openly. "As if I'd let them get away with hurting Rin. Especially over something as stupid as politics."

His expression did not relax. "This one's mother has likely forbidden you to interfere."

She treated him to a beatific smile. "Yes. I'm not to aid you, especially. But if I'm in danger, my companions are kinda obligated to save me-I just have to interpose myself between whoever I intend to rescue and the enemies and my work is done for me. That's how I usually work around Chiaki-sama's rule of non-interference. She thinks it's amusing."

Sesshomaru blinked, a measured motion that had all the significance of a far more grandiose gesture in someone else. "You are a very foolish ningen, miko, if you think that is a clever method."

Kagome made a face at the daiyoukai. "I _do _think it's a clever method-and so does your mother!" And with that juvenile taunt she flounced off to join the others.

"Something pleasant happen?" Miroku asked her as she drew near and Kagome realized she was wearing a wide smile.

"Just the day's small triumphs," Kagome said, repressed glee leaking from her voice. She'd been following court protocol for so long, she'd almost forgotten the pleasure of mouthing off to people fully capable of killing her. Speaking of small triumphs though, Inuyasha had his back to her and her body itched to spontaneously glomp him.

Perhaps her companions from the Court of the Moon read it in her body language-she could sense them tensing, growing serious.

Kagome carefully repressed her powers, burying them as deep as she could, which was to say, not very far, then did as she'd wanted to do since she'd seen Inuyasha, pouncing on him, arms circling around his neck, face buried deep in white hair that smelled like sweat.

"Hey!" he protested.

Just as quickly as she'd hugged him, Kagome released him, pleased to see a blush stained his cheeks. And that his hair remained white and his body intact.

The others relaxed, the dangerous portion over. Her powers were on an even keel today, perhaps restrained by her happiness at seeing her friends again. But not all days were good days. Youkai felt her power as something like a high-voltage shock of static electricity-but for hanyou without the durability of their fully demon parent, it was a bolt of lightning.

Those had been dark, trying months after she'd accidently purified a hanyou she'd been attempting to help. And before the memory could emerge fully, she tucked it away, in the secret pocket of her heart full of such black sorrows and old regrets.

Sesshomaru, who was looking on with the level of ennui only high-born youkai seemed to possess, might have noticed the tension in her fellows, but Inuyasha, Miroku, and Shippou seemed oblivious.

"Well," Miroku said with a chuckle, "since our reunion finally seems complete, let's depart."

"Kagome! I guess I'll-," whatever offer Inuyasha was about to make was abruptly cut off when he glanced toward her and found her already perched in the crook of Kuroren's left arm, balancing herself from the sudden movement with a hand on a broad shoulder.

Kagome realized a moment too late that Inuyasha had probably expected her to piggyback on him, as she always had, but three years of new habit had superseded the old one. Generally, when they traveled, they did so at Kagome's pace and she walked or rode horseback, but when they needed to travel with more than human speed, Kuroren carried her.

Aki was above such things as being a pack-mule and Sei willing, but his dragon form painfully noticeable and he not assertive enough to take the initiative before Kuroren.

This time, it was Kagome's turn to blush. "Oh-umm," as she fumbled for coherence, she could feel the tips of her ears burning. "Thanks for the offer, Inuyasha, but this will leave you free to fight if we encounter trouble on the way."

She could _hear _Aki rolling his eyes and she was close enough to feel Kuroren's soft sigh. "I mean no offense, Inuyasha-san," Kuroren addressed the hanyou, "but as Kagome-sama is in my charge, I feel more at ease keeping her close."

"Che," Inuyasha crossed his arms across his chest and tried to make light of it, "It's not like I wanted to haul her around anyway. Let's go." And with that he bounded off, leading the way.

Kuroren's long, easy loping stride kept pace, but didn't jar like Inuyasha's hell-for-leather approach to travel. Aki and Sei flanked the dark inu, Sei carrying their bags and Aki carrying a grudge for being made to trek through uncivilized wilderness. Miroku was not running desperately after them as he had been in their Jewel days-he'd acquired himself a fine horse at some point during his travels, the spirited creature not shying though it was among predators.

And though she could not see him, Kagome was certain that Sesshomaru would reach the slayer's village without incident. Or, at least, with less incident than this group would certainly have-it was winter and Kuroren would insist that her frail human body would catch cold if left to itself. Kagome was certain Inuyasha would have a fit and they'd argue until everyone was rested but them.

But, perhaps, Inuyasha knew more of inu culture than he let on, because he very pointedly did not comment when Kagome chose where to lay out her furs, Kuroren taking the measure of the wind before he lay in its path. It was Sesshomaru who became the problem, materializing out of the darkness like some long-dead, extremely disapproving ghost.

"Can I help you?" Kagome said at last, when she could take his staring anymore.

"Does this Sesshomaru's mother know you defile her generals?"

Kagome gritted her teeth and reminded herself that others were watching. "Yes."

"And she is accepting of this?" His tone was skeptical.

"Wholeheartedly supports it," Kagome told him sharply, sitting up so her position wouldn't imply submission. "Y'know, if I didn't know better, I would say you were the ignorant ningen. Not even Inuyasha said anything!"

And that pleased her hanyou companion, who smirked at the disgruntled youkai. "Yeah. Even a _half-breed _like me knows its rude to comment on pack matters-and an idiot could tell that the black bastard considers himself pack. He even smells like her, up close."

That was news to Kagome, who was struck by the need to send a speaking look to the general, but she resisted, because she'd locked eyes with Sesshomaru and wouldn't be the first to look away.

"And the other two are saturated in her scent-far more deeply than through mere pack interaction," Sesshomaru said.

_If you knew that earlier, why-? _Kagome answered her own question. Because if a kitsune and a ryuu chose to mingle scents with a miko, that was their business, but a powerful inu like Kuroren could shame them all by becoming infatuated with a human partner. "They're my shiki," Kagome said curtly, preferring to have the truth out than be suspected of being some sort of harlot.

"Shiki?" Inuyasha asked.

"Slaves," Sesshomaru said, tone edged with disgust.

"Faithful slave to the mistress's every whim and desire," Aki added unnecessarily, his instinct for making trouble apparently too great to resist. Kagome grit her teeth. In the reality of the Sengoku Jidai, sex only made you ritually impure, like eating meat or handling the dead. There were no Jesuits to insist on the existence of a hell, let alone to condemn you to it for having sex. And among the youkai, there weren't even the sexual norms adhered to by humans to ensure paternity. Like their bestial counterparts, many only bred when in heat, so there was little doubt to whom the offspring belonged. Some youkai did mate for life, but most were far more flexible when it came to what amounted to casual sex-that is, sex without the possibility of offspring. It was one of the reasons dallying with a human was taboo, for in this time period, use of contraceptives was limited to native herbs and suchlike.

But, despite _being _the aberration from the norm even in her time, Kagome would prefer that nosy demons at least lend her the illusion of privacy. It had caused her no end of satisfaction when she'd discovered that youkai couldn't actually smell virginity-it was an urban myth perpetuated by ignorant humans, which made a great deal of sense when you came down to the nitty-gritty fact that virginity was just the matter of the hymen being intact. They could, however, scent recent sex, so the rumormongers in the Court had always been in no shortage of stories about who was bedding who.

"Enough," Kagome said, forestalling any argument. "Sesshomaru, while I'm sure Kuroren appreciates your concern, it is a pack matter. Which means, unless _you _are in _my _pack, it's none of your business."

Sesshomaru looked disgruntled, but he didn't say anything more. Taking that as her victory, Kagome flopped over, the gesture losing some of its potency with the fact that from his perspective, it probably looked like she was snuggling into Kuroren's chest. Which she wasn't. He was just very, very close.

Suspiciously close, in fact. He usually only approached after she fell asleep and couldn't protest, her body unconsciously relaxing into his warmth. _Was he baiting Sesshomaru? _

When a clawed hand, with every indication of casual habit, crept up to rest on her side, she realized the answer to that was, _Yes, Yes, he was. _

And when she felt someone lay down at her back, the familiar scent of sweet spices alerted her the fact that it was Aki even before he pressed up against her, stifling his laughter in her hair.

_I hope you choke on it, _she thought sourly and tried to focus on going to sleep. All problems would look better in the light of morning.

-X-X-X-

With the glaring exception of the fact that Sesshomaru was treating her like she carried some sort of contagion-which wasn't that unusual, just that her usual offputting humanity had been upgraded to a mind-altering pheromone that led unsuspecting inu astray-everyone was surprisingly _normal _about the whole thing.

Far more than she'd been, in the beginning. For her part, she was a little dismayed that after analyzing her own feelings, she'd wanted Inuyasha to be jealous, just a little. But his casual understanding underscored what she'd already known; she would always be a very good friend and nothing more.

With a whispered request in Kuroren's ear, she was close enough to speak to Inuyasha. "You know," she said, mock-peevishly, "you never answered my letters." Then her voice softened, "Not that I was worried or anything, but it would have been nice to know how you were doing."

Inuyasha glanced at her, expression faintly guilty. "Well, I've been busy. Demon-hunting, you know. Edo is prime territory. And helping Kaede-I don't know if you know or not, but Kaede's been tutoring Rin." And Inuyasha had been present for that tutoring enough that he called the girl by name and not "that brat of Sesshomaru's."

"Did Rin-chan do well?" Kagome asked curiously, trying to imagine why, of all people, Sesshomaru would entrust his ward's education to a miko. Unless Rin was developing spiritual powers? Given how much time she'd spent in the company of youkai, that wouldn't be unusual. Even a latent power could become active with enough exposure. And time would only strengthen it.

"Yeah." And that set Inuyasha off and running, describing the small adventures he'd accompanied Rin on near the village. Which might explain why Sesshomaru was cooperating with them in this enterprise, rather than taking care of the enemy on his own.

"What about you?" he asked at last.

"Oh, Chiaki-sama keeps me busy." Kagome laughed, "I've probably covered as much or more of Japan during the last three years than I did during the jewel hunt. But I've also spent a lot of time at court; it was an eye-opening experience. Youkai really _aren't _human. But you already knew that. Still, I think...well, let's just say there were very few dull moments."

"And getting shiki?" His tone was deceptively casual, but Kagome had wondered when Inuyasha would bring the subject up.

Kagome was deeply shamed by her continued inability to use her powers as she ought to be able to. Especially with so many years of training. And, if she admitted that she needed shiki to draw off her power, it would only make her compare even more unfavorably to Kikyo. Dead but never completely forgotten, the prior Shikon miko was the measure by which Kagome judged herself and generally found many things wanting. She shrugged uncomfortably. "It just sort of happened."

"And what are shiki, exactly?"

"It's kind of like the binding that's on your necklace, but on a bigger scale-if I infuse my power into my voice, they can't disobey my commands," Kagome said quietly.

"So they really are slaves."

Kagome did not exercise her authority often, but the option was always there, just in reach. "Yes."

"Hn. And the black bastard?"

"Kuroren?" Kagome laughed. "He's Chiaki-sama's, in the end. Though I suppose you might say that about me, too, if you were to ask Chiaki-sama about it. Right?" she asked her makeshift transportation.

"Indeed," the black inu answered. "Chiaki-sama often finds it convenient to send Higurashi-sama as her representative to situations that involve ningen. In those situations, to speak to her is to speak to Chiaki-sama. But, as she is mortal, this places Higurashi-sama in some danger. It is my role that no strike is enacted against Chiaki-sama through Higurashi-sama's person."

"Sounds like a pain in the ass for you, Kagome," Inuyasha told her bluntly.

Kagome shrugged. "Oh, the kowtowing and ceremonial stuff is pretty snore-inducing, but it lets me help people. People who might not get help otherwise. Which is much better than being a pet of the Court."

"You could have done all that in the village," he pointed out gruffly.

"I know that, Inuyasha," she said dryly. "However, you haven't met Chiaki-sama. Only Sesshomaru ever says no to her and gets away with it."

"But you say no to Sesshomaru all the time."

"Well, yes. But it's different. If Sesshomaru doesn't like something, he just kills you. Chiaki-sama will make your life miserable first."

"Sounds like a bitch," he said casually. He glanced at Kuroren, as if waiting for the general to refute the statement, but he probably didn't realize the black inu's iron-clad training meant he would not participate in the conversation unless asked questions directly.

"Well, that is the technical term," Kagome agreed wryly. Kagome glanced back to check on the progress of the others and found Aki was eagerly holding conversation with Miroku, sitting cross-legged, his fan held casually in front of his face as four little wheels of foxfire conveyed him on invisible palanquin. And Shippou, the little trickster, was perched atop the bags on Sei's back, speaking to the dragon.

Sesshomaru was nowhere to be seen.

"I meant to ask earlier, but where are Jaken and Ah-Un?"

"They were retrieving some medicinal herbs for Kaede when you showed up. Once Rin recovers, they're supposed to bring her to meet us."

"Oh."

Taking that as the end of their conversation, Inuyasha increased his speed and left Kagome to thoughtfully mull over his news.

-X-X-X-

Kagome's first thought at the sight of the village, children of all ages spilling from doorways to gawk at them or regard them warily was, _Poor Sango. _There must have been twenty of them.

Kuroren, probably more careful of her dignity than Kagome herself was, had stopped within sight of the fortified village to let her walk the remaining distance on her own two feet. And Sesshomaru had materialized in all his haughty, fearsome presence just as they'd entered the walls, startling some children and sending a few of the younger ones shrieking.

"Ningen spawn," he'd said with distaste.

"Ningen do not spawn," Kagome hissed at him through what she hoped was an encouraging smile.

"You're right. Spawn typically smells better than ningen young."

"Children. Child-ren," she emphasized the syllables, like the inu was hard of hearing.

"The name will not change the smell."

"Then stop breathing," she replied cattily.

"Oy, are you two done arguing?" Inuyasha demanded, apparently fully capable of hearing them.

"This one does not stoop to argument with miko."

"And this humble miko would never be so unkind as to correct an inu who was too ignorant to know better," Kagome said.

"Miko," Sesshomaru rumbled, "you try this Sesshomaru's patience."

"Patience is a virtue," she recited offhandedly. "I'm helping you to develop your character, Sesshomaru-_sama._"

"I see I'm interrupting something," a dry, familiar voice said before Sesshomaru could reply.

"Sango!" Kagome smiled at the older woman, who hadn't changed much in the space of three years, though she did look very tired at the moment.

"Hello, Kagome." She surveyed the assembled group with brisk, professional interest. "I didn't realize Sesshomaru would be bringing so many demons."

Inuyasha snorted. "Oh, no, those aren't his. They came with Kagome."

"Really?" Sango glanced at him, then back to Kagome, who offered her a sheepish expression. "Well, I suppose that answers my question. I'd like to bring two of my trainees with me-this will be a good opportunity for them to face demons in a controlled environment." Sango waved her hand and two older children made their way to the front of the crowd, which Kagome could now see contained more than children, older faces of all ages interspersed here and there.

Kagome looked with interest at the two young slayers. A boy and a girl, the girl with a grim-set face made more serious by a thick scar than ran through her lip, the boy playing nervously with his hands, refusing to meet the eyes of the newcomers. "These are Asuka and Noboru. Greet the others," she told them, "This is the Shikon Miko and her companions, the ones I've told you about."

Asuka looked at them with suspicion. "The ones who killed the hanyou?"

"Yes," Sango replied.

Noboru ducked his head and muttered something, but Asuka continued to glare at them. Kagome, for the life of her, couldn't see why-those it could have something to do with the profusion of youkai, which was clearly making many of the villagers nervous.

Kagome walked up to where the little girl was standing, surprised to find her so small. She did not kneel, because she knew children this age were old enough to know when they were being condescended to. "The demons won't hurt you," she told her. "They're good youkai."

Asuka sneered. "There are no good youkai, only dead ones. That's what my dad said. Before they got him." She pointed accusingly at Kagome's companions.

Kagome glanced at them herself, trying to evaluate them from an outsider's perspective, but she'd always been a bit peculiar. Most of her friends had tried to kill her at one point or another. She couldn't see anyone truly frightening, with the notable exception of Sesshomaru, who was making no effort to disguise that the dislike was mutual.

Kagome shared a speaking glance with Sango and she realized that the woman's motivation for taking these children was not to give them experience in combat, but to even their worldview. Eyeing Sesshomaru again, Kagome thought, _Good luck with that. _


	3. The Menace in the North (Pt 1)

Disclaimer: Don't own it.

A/N: What can I say? This story's fun.

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter Three-

The Menace in the North (Pt. 1)

Just as if they really were a traveling circus, there were certain logistics that had to be ironed out. Sesshomaru refused to move at a pace Sango's children would be able to keep, citing his already generous patience in making this detour to begin with. Kagome had offered Sei as a method of transportation, but one look at the dragon's true form had sent Noboru into tears.

"What kind of demon slayer breaks into tears at the sight of a demon?" Asuka asked him with scorn clear in her voice.

Kagome wanted to scold her, but sighed instead. Glancing over at her mount, she admitted that he was no placid vegetarian steed like Ah-Un, who was belonged to the summer ryuu class.

"Then how about this, Asuka-chan? Since you're not afraid of him, you can ride on Sei," she offered, not noticing until too late Sango's gestures in the negative.

The girl's expression blackened. "Don't want to ride no stinkin' demon," she muttered.

Sei, who smelt like dried lemongrass and a snowstorm, had probably never smelled bad in his life, unless splattered with the viscera of his enemies. _Oh. Right. She's obviously been in a demon attack before, so why not offer her a ride on an enormous, flesh-eating dragon? Smooth move, Kagome. _

Miroku, as per usual, saved the day. "I would be honored, young miss, if you would ride with me," he offered, gesturing to his sleek black mare.

Asuka eyed him suspiciously, her gaze straying to the horse, then snapping back to the monk. Then over to Sango, who nodded. "Alright," she agreed.

"Good," Sango said with some relief. "And Noboru can ride with me on Kirara. That means everyone's settled, then."

And shooing her young male charge toward a firecat suddenly engulfed in flame, the expanded Inu-tachi prepared to move out, toward the north and a disturbance that no one knew much about. Rumors had been flying, but none could agree on what was happening or explain the mysterious disappearances. As sad as it was, until it had encroached on their interests, the West had been pleased to let well enough alone and allow the North to deal with their own troubles.

As she understood it, Rin had been in the north, but still within the territorial lines of the West when she'd been attacked. By who or what they still did not know, Rin being conscious but not coherent when she'd been found.

For now, they were allowing her to sleep off the hysteria, Kaede plying her with herbs for calm and rest.

With a sigh, she allowed Kuroren to pick her up again, her red hakama billowing with the movement, then they were off.

-X-X-X-

Kuroren had performed many functions in his long life. He'd begun as an assassin, picked from his litter by Chiaki-sama's dam, for express use by the daughter she knew would grow to be great. Under Chiaki-sama, he'd been known as the Black Plague during the last wars among the inu and the neko.

When she'd mated the youkai who would later betray her with a human, she'd brought not only her own strength, but her personal army with her. And hers they stayed-her people were not pawns upon the Great General's battlefield. They came and went at her orders or not at all. While the General had a great many talents, political far-sightedness was not among them. But Chiaki-sama knew well how to play the long game, managing her emotionally-driven mate as best she could while accruing cultural as well as military glory upon the House of the West.

And then came her split with the Inu no Taisho, where she'd captured her palace in the sky, intending to hold it only until her mate saw reason.

But reason never came.

Time eventually blunted the wound dealt to her pride, Chiaki-sama coming to appreciate her freedom and the landscape among the clouds. Peace reigned and Kuroren was not asked to resume his former duties. Instead, the curiosity that was Higurashi had come to the Court Among the Clouds. Kuroren was no stranger to ningen-he had killed many, driven others to madness with his poison, fought against their monks and miko. But Higurashi was unlike them in many ways-no matter how deeply she bowed and how carefully she spoke, she could not hide her strangeness.

The was much of a youkai in her manner, her forthright speech and carriage, even in the color of her eyes. Kuroren rarely had reason to single out one human from the rest, but for him and many youkai, they were such a nearly homogenous group that they were lumped into a single word: ningen. They were born without clan markings, their hair the same, their eyes the same. And they died so quickly, there was generally no need to bother memorizing the tiny variations that made them unique.

Higurashi did not have the eyes of a human. Hers were a slate blue-grey, like a stormy winter sky. And she stunk of purity-if she had a personal scent, it was obscured by the sharp, stinging wash of her power.

It had made him curious. And so he had watched the little human he was not certain was entirely human, the thought affirmed often as he saw her interact with other ningen. Literacy could be excused-but her knowledge of mathematics was the equal or better of a skilled architect, she insisted to the ignorant peasantry that the world was governed by "laws" and certain superstitions were only superstitions, though there were certainly spirits to be appeased, and she seemed unconcerned by the constantly shifting powers among the human forces, almost as if she knew how it would all work itself out in the end.

None of these skills were things she displayed openly, but she could be caught working out complicated mathematics involving shapes and numbers, or writing down theories on the natural sciences. When he'd asked her, she'd mumbled something about, "I don't want to forget," before leading the conversation down a different path.

Which implied that she was not inventing such things as she went. Regarding such advanced knowledge as common was not a ningen trait-if he was given to fancy he might have said it was the province of the kami. So, for now, he had limited himself to the decision that she was not quite human, but her immense power and strange knowledge did not necessarily make her divine.

For a curiosity, Chiaki-sama had chosen well, but to understand to allure of mortals? She had chosen poorly.

He spoke of none of these observations to his ruler-his role was not that of spy, but guard and a guard with a loose tongue often lost it and perhaps his life as well. And her strangeness did not detract from Higurashi-sama's charisma; she genuinely liked others and was liked in return, Kuroren not being exempt from this. He was fond of his charge and bullying her in the name of indoctrinating her in inu youkai culture was his dearest hobby.

The mutual regard was not universal-there were major exceptions, such as Chiaki-sama's pup. Kurogen glanced over at the other inu, who was almost of an age with him, but Kuroren had never been able to discern what went one beyond that amber gaze. Awful in power, but lacking in many ways, almost as if he had gotten all the traits his father had been missing while accruing none of the traits that had made his father great.

As the old inu maxim ran, _He who knows not touch cannot lead men into battle. _Touch in this case encompassing all the softer, familial bonding actions of the inu pack. Being touched and touching in return was a manifestation of the mutual feelings that were needed to bind inu-from these sprang loyalty, friendship, and the platonic love one bore for one's pack, and it was these, not some hard notion of _duty, _that made inu youkai formidable opponents in battle. Unlike the sly neko, who could not trust even their own kind, an inu was part of an inseparable unit, all his weaknesses shored up by the strengths of his companions.

In this, Kuroren thought that Higurashi-sama had a truer understanding of what it meant to be an inu than Sesshomaru-sama himself. It was also the reason that, while Sesshomaru might _lead_, he did not truly _rule_.

Noticing the daiyoukai's eyes upon him and his miko burden again, Kuroren took the opportunity to press his face into the miko's side, her perch on his arm putting her at a level where the top of his head brushed the underside of her breasts as he did so. Higurashi-sama, who would have shrieked and toppled from his arm only two years ago, absentmindedly stroked his hair as she kept an eye on her companions.

His red eyes were full of smug triumph as he caught the small expression of disgust that crossed the otherwise stoic face of the daiyoukai. Perhaps this journey would provide an opportunity for Chiaki-sama's most daunting project: teaching her unfortunately stunted son how to express himself as an inu. So far as Kuroren knew, Sesshomaru even slept alone; it was no wonder he was such a hard, viscous personality.

-X-X-X-

Kagome's eyes narrowed as she glanced from Sesshomaru to Kuroren. She sensed some sort of male posturing-Kuroren was being even more touchy than usual, which, considering he more or less made himself her shadow when in the field, was quietly bypassing endurable and moving straight into aggravating.

And Inuyasha apparently thought it was hilarious. They'd made camp well after darkness had fallen and Miroku's poor mare had slowed to a grudging walk. It was, of course, a qualified disaster with the newcomers and humans who lacked the night vision of their youkai companions. As they scrambled for suitable deadwood and Kagome had pined for a hotsprings, Kuroren had seemingly read her mind and offered to locate a suitable water source for her to bathe in.

It wasn't just a gesture towards her material comfort-filth could be both metaphorical and literal, in Shinto belief, after all, and her powers grew more restless if she did not bathe on a regular basis. Being among her friends made this more important than when she traveled with no one other than Kuroren, who was a daiyoukai in his own right, and her shiki, whose bindings afforded them some measure of protection against accidental purification. Inuyasha, who she knew to have unstable demon blood, would be vulnerable, as would Shippou, whose powers were still immature.

"It would seem this one's mother has made you a true lady of the court-can you not even travel without a servant for your bath?" Sesshomaru sneered.

Kagome was going to great lengths to be understanding about Sesshomaru's tetchy attitude, but explaining it away as his worry about Rin could only excuse so much. Still, she kept her silence on this one, knowing younger ears were listening in with great curiosity.

Kuroren, however, had an inu's sense of privacy-that is to say, very little at all. While communal bathing _was _practiced in feudal Japan, just as in modern-day Japan, it generally saw a limited amount of interaction between the bathers. Not so the inu. Grooming each other was a common bonding practice among mammals, as any nature show could tell you, and just because they were youkai did not mean they weren't also dogs.

This was not to imply Kuroren had ever actually helped her bathe-that was where Kagome firmly drew the line. And she enforced it. Violently. As Inuyasha or Miroku might well bear witness.

"Rare is the one so honored, my lord," Kuroren replied glibly, "Who even among the great youkai can claim to have helped the Shikon Miko wash away the dust of this world? One might even compare it to enlightenment."

With a sound like he was asphyxiating, Inuyasha tried to contain his laughter, but then gave up a losing battle. "That was such a damn Miroku line," he howled.

Miroku smiled, opening his mouth to make some reply, but Kagome stared him down. "Say just one word," she warned, "and I'll show you enlightenment-by way of pain."

"Kagome-sama, you wound me," the monk replied.

Kagome rolled her eyes. "Really, Sesshomaru, what is your problem? Can't you just go back to being so high-and-mighty you won't even deign to speak to us?"

"As it seems that would give you satisfaction, this Sesshomaru declines. Though this one does not do it for his pleasure-your interactions are unnatural. This one's honored mother has learned much depravity in among her treasures and vain trappings, if one is to believe you, in that she encourages such things."

Kagome bristled instantly. "Now look here," she said, marching over to the daiyoukai, "you don't have any room to speak-as far as inu are concerned, _you're _the unnatural one! You're-you're," she scrambled for words, "emotionally castrated! You can't even form a proper pack. Instead you march around Japan with a dragon, a kappa, and a little ningen girl for company."

Suddenly realizing the import of the words that had tumbled from her mouth, Kagome took a step back, hands sliding up to cover her lips, as if she might gather the words in her hand and seal them back in.

It was one thing to say something like that to Inuyasha-their friendship was strong enough to survive the nasty comments that often defined it. But Sesshomaru, Lord of the Western Lands? She'd forgotten, in her happiness to be back among people with whom she could speak freely, that he wasn't someone to criticize so easily.

"You would dare say such thing to this Sesshomaru?" he said in a quiet, deadly voice, his youki gathering around him.

"Now, Sesshomaru-sama," Miroku rushed to say, "I'm sure she didn't mean anything by it." Any further attempts at appeasement were cut short by the red-tinted glare given to the monk.

"Don't!" Kuroren barked at Sesshomaru, but he paid the general no mind, instead using his signature acid attack to attempt to make Kagome nothing more than an unpleasant memory.

And if she had ever had the reigns to her power, she lost them.

White light sizzled and crackled, little bolts of static electricity a forerunner to a coming storm as her powers began to purify the very air, the negative emotions that blanketed the world in an invisible miasma fleeing from the compassionless light. Wrapping her arms around herself, as if the physical gesture would help, Kagome tried to stop the power she was a vessel to.

But it wasn't something that could be moved by kind and gentle emotions-it needed the leash of ritual, which she could provide. Her voice already heavy with power, she called out, "Seiichi! Kinakihiko! Karakurenai!" Though the last was far away, she caught a glimpse of him as he turned to her, lips parting in a grin that revealed teeth like a shark's. Closer, she felt Sei wrapping her in his body, his thick scales most suited to providing protection for the others while Kuroren and Aki evacuated the others.

Sei hummed to her as his elongated body swirled around her like the closing coils of a boa constrictor. _All will be well, _he sang, _all will be well. _

Tears made a warm trail down her face, but she gulped down her sobs, trying to control the building maelstrom. "Please stop," she whispered raggedly, "Please." Sometimes, that was enough. She prayed that it would be enough.

It was reluctant to do so-its purpose was to purge and she was keeping it from the reason from its existence. But it was not actually a living being, so it held no grudge against her, no anger-it began to subside, slowly. Still Sei cradled her, his scales blackening, but he made no comment other than his eternal refrain-_All will be well. _

"Hush," Aki crooned into her ear, familiar arms gently drawing her into a firm chest, one clawed hand coming to cover her eyes. She could smell, in the blackness, when his clothes started to smolder, but the vain kitsune said no word of complaint. "You have to save us."

_From myself, _Kagome thought bitterly. But bitterness only edged her power back into awareness, so she let it slip from her grasp, emptying herself of emotion so that there was a hollow place for the power to return to.

Aki supported more and more of her weight as she slipped into the familiar half-death of crippling herself. Burying what she was. But it was what was necessary to live a life that approximated normality. And then, finally, she lost consciousness.

-X-X-X-

Aki winced as cradling Kagome-sama made him ever more aware of the inflamed skin where her power had scalded him. Gathering the miko more securely into his arms, he prepared to move her as Sei opened his coils to let Kuroren enter. The kitsune glared at the inu, who looked unrepentant.

"This is your fault!" Aki grumbled. "Kagome-sama will feel guilty about this for weeks-and you know how she gets. She makes _you _feel guilty because she feels guilty about losing control of her power, so then you have to feel bad about being hurt, as if you could do anything against _that_...," he muttered, but Kuroren was ignoring them, his superior scent of smell and hearing making him the best guide to find a source of running water.

Flashing through the trees with youkai quickness, they were soon at a broad stream. Slipping off his outer garments, Sei entered the water first, drawing out the cold. He held his hands out for the miko and Aki passed her to him, deft hands already shedding his ruined kimono. Then he waded in, the water coming only to his knees, but it ran swiftly even in the winter, which was the most important part.

Cradling Kagome-sama in his arms once again, Aki knelt with a grace that had taken centuries to perfect. The miko didn't even stir as the bottoms of her feet brushed the water, then he submerged her deeper, until he was holding her in a sitting position.

Kuroren hovered by the bank, but did not join them-as an outsider and a youkai, his presence could only contaminate, not cleanse. While breaking taboos and allowing filth to accumulate did weaken Kagome-sama's power, its far more substantial effect was to cause her to lose control of it.

Seeing his own red and blistered skin was a reminder of that. Sei stooped with great solemnity, filling his cupped palms with water, bringing them above Kagome's head, then allowing the water to trickle down like rain. "May the kami of heaven and earth grant purification," Sei murmured, "Let the impurities by swept away by Seoritsu Hime, she who dwells in the rivers running from the mountains, let her take them with her on her journey to the ocean."

A gurgling laugh as the stream passed them by told him that the kami also found the idea of two youkai going through the motions of a purification rite amusing-at least, Aki thought with relief, there were no other youkai nearby.

Sei repeated the ritual motions, this time without words, until Kagome-sama was soaked through, her clothes pasted to her body. Probing tentatively with his youki, he found that her power was now at ease. He thought they'd gone through the ritual soon enough to prevent the worst of the backlash. By nature, everything accumulated impurity. The impurity itself, slight as it was if addressed in a timely fashion, was not necessarily harmful. But when Kagome-sama retracted her powers forcefully, she also turned them on herself, the purification scouring her body with no regard to the delicate balance that allowed mortal bodies to function.

This more delicate way to remove impurity was the only way to ameliorate that process-so they had discovered, through trial and error.

_If you were less kind, many a time you could have saved us from this headache, _the cranky and now sopping wet kitsune thought at his mistress. But he was still careful not to jostle her as he rose, shivering when Sei abruptly stopped drawing the cold from the water. Glaring at his fellow shiki, he noticed he'd transferred his gaze to Kagome-sama and Aki realized that all the points where his skin was in contact with Kagome-sama's body still felt warm.

It was an amazing feat of concentration, to draw the cold from both the water and the air, but the winter ryuu managed it with an appearance of ease. Not to be outdone, Aki conjured foxfires capable of producing heat and set them to hover close to the mistress.

"She will be grieved, now that her friends have discovered her unfortunate strength," Sei observed in his measured, resonant voice.

Aki winced. There was that to consider-the emotional fallout was never pretty, but with her bosom companions? Endless apologies would follow. In this one thing, he wished she'd take after The Great Bitch of the West, but that was too much to hope for.

"Damn that Sesshomaru," Aki cursed. And then he turned his glare on the silent black inu. "And _you-_why did you taunt him?"

Kuroren tilted his head slightly to the right. "I was not alone in provoking the lord. And even without provocation, a youkai such as he needs little enough excuse. From her stories, it seems his attempts to kill her are something of a greeting ritual."

_Greeting ritual?! _Aki was astonished at the general's talent for chronic understatement. Next he'd be playing it off as a misguided attempt to win Kagome-sama's friendship, simply because there was an established precedent.

When Kuroren had out his hands in silent offer to take Kagome-sama, Aki made a show of gathering her close. "I think not, pochi. No telling what you'd let happen to the mistress. Wag your tail at her while she's awake, if you like, but my guess is she's going to be displeased with you, too. If you hadn't had the asinine idea that the white son of a bitch would take you, of all of us, snuggling with a priestess any less than personally, we wouldn't be having this conversation!"

"Complain if you like," Kuroren said with red eyes narrowed, "But Higurashi-sama herself was the one to confront him. While nothing she said was untrue, Sesshomaru-sama has going to great lengths to insure that such unpleasant things rarely reach his ears. In the Western Fortress, such things are only spoken in whispers, even during his long absences. It is not becoming to show doubt before your lord, after all."

Aki sniffed haughtily, knowing the effect was somewhat spoiled by the way his red-gold hair was spilling over his shoulders in disarray.

"And, as _you _are aware, Sesshomaru has no patience for the innuendo so beloved of the courts you are accustomed to haunting. Simply because he did not strike after one of your comments does not mean you did not contribute to the situation."

"Are you insinuating something?"

"No. I insinuate nothing-you also had a hand in this night's events. Though Chiaki-sama has already punished you once, you do not seem to realize that responsibility is not something that can be shrugged off, kitsune."

"If you start calling names, I'm leaving," a voice spoke weakly from his arms.

"Kagome-sama! You've awakened already." Aki's brow furrowed. Usually it took much longer for her to recover. Had more of her energy been expended in purifying Sesshomaru's acid than he realized?

Kagome shifted restlessly, scowling at her wet clothes and hair. "I called upon Karakurenai-you know how much power that takes."

Aki scowled at the thought of the oni. "Yes. Let us be thankful your call was not strong enough to force him to materialize."

"And turn it into a bloodbath?" Kagome asked incredulously. "You think I'd, even for a moment, considering giving that monster an excuse to try and take on someone like Sesshomaru? It's bad enough that they have to know about _this_, but Karakurenai...," she trailed off, burying her face in her hands. After a moment, she took a deep breath, then folded her hands across her lap. "I'd prefer they not know about Karakurenai. Kami, to take on a youkai so wild it didn't even have a name-even if the others don't realize the implications, Sesshomaru will. You can't use a shiki like that for anything but battle."

Aki frowned, a gesture mirrored faintly on Kuroren's face. But then the inu's features smoothed out. "The others are at work creating a new campsite. Would you like to rejoin them now?"

Kagome sighed, brushing back a wet hank of hair that had come loose. "Well, it's not like I have anywhere to run. Time to go back and face the music, I guess."

Despite not being familiar with the idiom, he knew the sentiment.

A/N: As always, writing something set in a foreign culture is a learning process-if you see something mistaken and know better, feel free to correct me. If it isn't a plot point, I'll generally go back and correct it. I am trying hard not to anglicize anything, so it's always appreciated. I know some people don't like to receive long reviews, but I feel, whether good or bad (in the sense of constructive criticism), they are what help me grow most as an author.


	4. The Menace in the North (Pt 2)

Disclaimer: Copyright still belongs to the appropriate parties.

A/N: Reviews inspire! Tell me who you do and don't like, tell me which characters I'm doing well or what I'm doing wrong. I love feedback.

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter Four-

The Menace in the North (Pt. 2)

Kagome struggled to walk on her own into the newly relocated camp. Only stubbornness was holding her upright, but she smoothed the strain from her face, replacing it with a calm, pleasant smile. In part, it was court survival instinct; she would not show such exploitable weakness to Sesshomaru. The other was concern for the children. She didn't want to give them the impression that she was unreliable or dangerous. Staggering back in, defeated by her own power, was not the way to build trust.

She'd been unable to explain to Chiaki-sama's satisfaction why it was so _difficult _for her to control her power. To the lady, power was something inborn that grew and developed with a pup. Kagome had been born to her power as well-though she couldn't actually imagine having the Jewel in her as a baby, though it must have been. Had it displaced her organs to make room for itself? As an infant, the unbroken Jewel would have taken up most of her body cavity, if it had maintained a solid form. And it must have, for Mistress Centipede to take it from her side like she'd done.

It was Kagome's private thought that being born with the Jewel inside her had somehow twisted her powers. Spiritual powers weren't uncommon among miko-healing, foresight and divination, even the powers of a medium weren't unknown-but purification was granted by the kami. It was not something that dwelled in people, not even miko. But Kagome had never needed to invoke the kami, never needed a ceremony, never needed to levy the spirits for aid.

Her hand settled unconsciously over her heart, twisting the white fabric that lay over her chest. She'd been powerful with her soul incomplete, even under seal, but her power only grew stronger. _Will I one day be devoured by it? _Her nervous glance took in the shiki by her side, Kuroren at her heels. _Kami-sama_, she pleaded, tossing her wish into the wind, to carry it to what ears it would, _please don't let me endanger them, when that time comes. None of them. _

-X-X-X-

Sesshomaru was perturbed. He was aware that the miko was a power; he could hardly overlook her contributions in the battle against the spider hanyou. In fact, he'd likely been the one ally among her mismatched rabble that had a real grasp of the depth of her latent ability.

The fingers of his left hand twitched slightly as he recalled the cold wall of power that had rolled out from the dragon, forcing them all to retreat, then the kitsune, eyes glowing gold, eight tails outlined in the same fearsome light, had conjured mounts of light and shadow that carried them all in skeletal bellies until they reached a point that the kitsune seemed to deem safe, the creatures disappearing with a wail.

Kuroren had been there as well, hell-red eyes hard and trained on a single point in the distance, an inferno of power that seemed poised any moment to bloom, long petals of white light caressing the countryside and obliterating whatever unclean things dwelt there. His gaze touched on Sesshomaru's for a moment, then as the petals began to reverse their direction, furling tightly under some force, he was off in an instant, taking to the shadows.

What the miko had said to him had been highly insulting-but what was unforgiveable was his response and the words that had prompted her own. Whether the black inu chose to dally with a human was none of his concern-he belonged to his mother, therefore his sins were hers to punish.

He was more confused by his mother's actions concerning the miko than he would ever admit aloud. He of all youkai knew what cause she had to dislike the very relationship that seemed to be building between the girl and Kuroren.

But if she chose to indulge whatever whim had caught her fancy this century, it was her right to do so. Even he, as Lord of the West, had little influence over her unfettered, floating kingdom that she littered with the treasures that would have satisfied a dozen human kingdoms in the west, built upon the bones of ancient dragons.

Still, no matter his mother's actions, his own words had been a failing of his own discipline, which was a slip not to be allowed. The edginess he was experiencing could be ascribed to a variety of factors. It seemed there would be an unfortunate overlap in Rin and Inuyasha's coming into sexual maturity; now that there was no threat of Naraku to distract them, his nobles split their time between warring for territory and nagging him, and now this business to the north.

The humans were forever breeding, so Sesshomaru did not see the point behind the fuss they made about the deaths of their kind. They were so short-lived, it should be an end that was expected. But fuss they did and it was not beyond imagination that they would begin a purge of every youkai they stumbled across.

Such was against the wishes of all the cardinal lords and was in part why Sesshomaru had been granted disposition to enter the territory of the Sky-Crowned King. For a daiyoukai such as himself, entering the territory of another was naturally stressful, for his actions were constrained by the need to avoid all suspicion of taking what was the King's by right. And she, like he, was not one to forgive. Sekishi was also new-come, so to speak, to her position. His father's last battle had consequences that had stretched across two territories, the tremors felt even in the East and South.

None of this was excuse enough to have broken his silence. But it was useless to castigate himself for something that had already occurred. He was left with no course but to proceed. However, the matter of _how _he was to proceed eluded him. And it seemed he was not the only one left in doubt. The humans and the hanyou were huddled together, speaking in low voices, the exception being the slayer, who was talking to the two young she had brought with her.

A scent upon the breeze alerted him to the approach of the miko. Sesshomaru frowned. It was unlike himself to offer an apology, so he would not give one. But he would take time to himself as soon as it would go unnoticed and meditate, searching for what had caused the disturbance. For him, it was nothing more than a small irritation, but in a ningen? This might be a part of the hysteria that had claimed Rin.

For there were youkai capable of spreading emotion like a contagion-fear here, anger there, so tangling their opponents in their own feelings it was difficult to face them effectively. Sesshomaru suspected what they were going to investigate in the north was a kamikakushi, but one more widespread than what was usual. Any other unusual features would be valuable to them in isolating their target, but it did not mean his was grateful for being forced to voice his inner disapproval.

For Sesshomaru would kill anyone or anything that forced him to act against his will, with the noted exception of his mother, who had been doing so for centuries and would continue to do so.

The miko did well to conceal her weakness in her expression, which would suffice for the ningen, but he could smell the exhaustion that soaked her, the sharp tang of something intangible burned, as if her purity had scorched the deepest recesses of her body, leaving her perfect and aching.

He had noted the quick response to her loss of control from her companions, the orderly fashion in which they had dealt with the bystanders. It was obvious to anyone with eyes this was not the first time such a tremendous loss of control had occurred. Sesshomaru's eyes narrowed and his lips tightened at the corners, not quite pulling down into a frown.

Such a show of power would have left any other miko exhausted, their power drained. But though Kagome _was _exhausted, her power still thrummed strongly, a vibration he could feel in his bones as she drew nearer. _Was this the reason she required shiki? _His realization was sudden, but once it occurred, the pieces fell neatly into place.

She had subjugated daiyoukai, not because she had grown arrogant or power-hungry, but because she needed an outlet for her power, just as wild and powerful young inuyoukai were encouraged to form packs.

Drawing herself up, she bowed to them all, slick, wet black hair tumbling forward over her shoulders. The silk she wore was damp as well and would have been translucent if it had been thinner. Large foxfires accompanied her, but he could see the blue tinge of her nails, the subtle tremors that proclaimed she was growing chilled. Surely her retainers noticed as well, but it seemed the miko was insisting on making an apology first.

"I'm so sorry," she started, her voice quiet and uncertain. Somehow the tone, meek as it was, managed to be offensive to Sesshomaru. Surely any being with the power she carried within her should have confidence, even in the face of such accidents. They should not shrink at something as foolish as the disapproval of someone like his hanyou brother. "Is everyone alright?"

"What the hell was that?" Inuyasha demanded.

"I-," while obvious to Sesshomaru, it was apparent that Kagome was hesitant in admitting her loss of control to the less perfect senses of the others.

"You nearly fried me!" the hanyou snarled. "Just what kind of training did that bitch give you? At least before, you were just useless, not dangerous."

"It would seem," the kitsune drawled, "that apologies are wasted on one such as him, Kagome-sama."

"Silence, Aki," the miko commanded sharply and the kitsune resume a sulky silence. "I _am _sorry, Inuyasha. But any loss of control is my fault; Chiaki-sama was _very_ thorough in her training." There was a hint of old humor there, but it was quickly swallowed by the somber attitude the miko had adopted.

_It did not suit her. _It was a surprising thought, but true. It was an expression his own courtiers might have worn, but the atmosphere in his mother's home was brighter, wilder, both more and less constrained. It reminded him of the unhappiness of Rin, when she'd desired to be introduced to his world, to have a public role as well as a private one.

Within two months, the novelty was no longer enough to ameliorate the slow death of paperwork and boredom that was the reality of the bureaucratic entity that was the Western Lands. Sesshomaru himself oversaw the system, but rarely submerged himself in it, preferring to leave the tedious work to trusted, well-picked subordinates.

But once introduced, it was not so easy for Rin to simply bow out, pleading disinterest-that would only erode the legitimacy of her place at Sesshomaru's side. So Sesshomaru, taking pity on his miserable ward, had invented a reason that fortuitously turned out to be a reality.

Rin had begun with only the faintest sparks of reiki, but once ensconced in his half-brother's village, free to come and go as she pleased, those sparks had kindled into a steady flame.

But it was only a flame, of the sort that ningen gathered around to keep themselves warm on winter nights, a healing, warm sort of power. Defensive rather than offensive, nurturing and perhaps faintly maternal.

The Shikon miko was an inferno. It could not be used in the same manner as a hearthfire; it would burn down the house and devour the inhabitants.

Power respected power, but Sesshomaru had mixed feelings about the miko. Sheer power alone was not enough.

Still, it seemed peculiar that the miko simply stood and _took _the abuse his brother heaped upon her head. Even in the days when they'd been chasing fragments of the jewel, she usually snapped and started yelling back, if she didn't dissolve into angry tears.

Until he shifted and he saw the blankness of her eyes. _It's taking all her effort to stand, _he recognized, _She probably can't even hear him. _

Kuroren grew restive at the miko's back, but he apparently was just as leashed as her shiki, for he did not interfere.

At the end, when Inuyasha ran out of words, she simply murmured, "I'm sorry, everyone. I'll see you tomorrow morning."

-X-X-X-

It was not her first winter camp. She was glad for the deep snow as Kuroren scooped them out a bed in the snow, building up the sides to form a windbreak. Still, she shivered as Aki helped her change her clothes, which were a blessing from the kami. Silk, when layered, trapped body heat and made fairly suitable winter attire, but there was nothing about it that could equal the comfort of a thicker, sturdier cloth.

Like a doll, when she was dressed, she was handed to Kuroren, who cradled her close to his chest, then Aki was pressed against her back, just as when they had been taunting Sesshomaru. And there, secure between two bulwarks of power, knowing that Sei would be nearby, Kagome gave into her misery and slept.

-X-X-X-

He knew she would never allow it when awake, but Kuroren still licked away her tears, the salt pleasant on his tongue, but the residual purity stung. It was just as it should be.

When he was certain she had cried herself out, her sleep approaching coma, he slipped from the warm nest, Sei slithering in as he rose, handling the miko with as much tenderness as if he really held a pearl of wisdom. Aki's green eyes glittered in the pale light shed upon the scene, but then he buried his nose in the female's hair, his eight tails curling to lay over her like an elegant fur. With her bearskin cloak draped over her, it almost appeared as if she had her own pelt and it contrasted sharply on one side with the warm red-gold of the kitsune's tail and on the other with the crystalline white of the dragon's skin, refracting in such a way it was impossible not to notice the patterns of scales along the forearm that kept Higurashi-sama close.

Satisfied that she was both protected and cared for, Kuroren made his silent way across the camp. He found his target on the outskirts, back to a tree, one leg drawn up, gaze focused to the south.

He, apparently, was unworthy of even a glance, but Kuroren was patient. He knelt in the snow, waiting until Sesshomaru acknowledged that this was not a discussion but an audience. And, at last, the white inu transferred his gaze to him, one brow raising in silent inquiry.

"It is somewhat belated, but your honored mother sends her greetings. Knowing Higurashi-sama, she thought she might forget to present them in her eagerness."

Silence was his only reply.

"She also sends warning that if you do intentional harm to her miko, she will expect to be duly recompensed."

A flat look.

"And if you damage her irreversibly, she says it is only fair to trade one miko for another, her Higurashi for your Rin."

"You will tell this one's honored mother that she will keep her claws far from what is mine!" Sesshomaru barked.

Kuroren wore a cold, satisfied smile. "Rin is yours to protect; Higurashi-sama is mine."

"There is no parallel," the white lord asserted, "Your concern for the miko is a commission, nothing more."

"You have never been in a position to serve, so you do not know, Sesshomaru-sama, but it is possible to appreciate one's duty."

"Hn."

"My advice is to do nothing. All Higurashi-sama requires for friendly acquaintanceship is a lack of active violence against her person, though there have been _notable _exceptions to that." He was aware his tone was full of old memories, but Sesshomaru was not a beast to be led by his curiosity. "If you struggle, she will begin to worry you dislike her, which will make her try harder to cultivate your friendship."

He could see Sesshomaru absorbing this information, analyzing it behind opaque amber eyes.

"You might find her," he cast about for the proper word and settled for, "_aggressive_ in this. Kagome does not take friendship lying down, nor is she satisfied until her friendship or scolding has made you a better person. The only exception to this seems to be Inuyasha."

"Hn."

Message delivered, Kuroren made to rise and take his leave, but Sesshomaru forestalled him by speaking. "The miko-does she often lose control of her power?" 

Kuroren watched the other inu narrowly as he considered his answer. "It is worse in winter, when she is called on less to patrol."

"And it always leaves her so damaged?"

"No. Almost never. For when we hunt, there is prey aplenty for her." His red eyes flickered momentarily toward the camp, where so many life forces were bedded down. "And less fragile pack."

"You regard her as pack?" The question was asked dispassionately, but it was easy to see it was important to Sesshomaru.

Kuroren took in the form of his lady's son, who was said to have already surpassed his exalted father. But for all the praise he garnered and territory he possessed, there was some quality absent from him, something that made him seem at home in the snow while the world was dead and sleeping. "Yes, Sesshomaru-sama."

"In what respect do you hold her?" Sesshomaru pressed.

Kuroren had thought that obvious. "Higurashi-sama is a beta-female in Chiaki-sama's pack. I am a beta-male. We are equals. Higurashi-sama is pleased to call us friends."

"You do not court her?"

"There is nothing to worry over, Sesshomaru-sama. Even if she should allow such intimacies and somehow refrain from purifying her partner, her body would not support hanyou offspring. Nor human offspring, for that matter. So far as her power would be concerned, it would be the intrusion of foreign matter, which would immediately require cleansing. What you fear, that she will become another Izayoi, cannot come to pass."

"You have given this matter thought," Sesshomaru said, tone faintly accusing.

"Not I. Your honored mother's physicians from China are working compiling the most complete treatise on anatomy ever written. In order to prevent something...unseemly from happening to other miko, Higurashi-sama volunteered to be their living study. She reassured them that the internal parts would be much the same as other human females, but her power affects the function of said organs in a way that roused their interest. This is why there is no recorded hanyou offspring of youkai and miko, because such a thing is impossible."

"And yet other miko retire and are bred," Sesshomaru pointed out.

"With human fathers. Higurashi-sama is an oddity."

It was obvious that Sesshomaru was questioning how they had managed to test such a thing, but had no desire to voice his question.

"Ningen are in a permanent state of heat, maintained by a monthly cycle. Recently, Higurashi-sama has become like their old females. She is no longer capable of bearing young."

Whether she knew this or not was a matter none of her retainers were privy to. While it would be obvious to her that she no longer bled, Kuroren did not know if she understood that her body, maintained in a constant state of purity, would never accommodate such a change as whelping.

"Hn." Sesshomaru's expression was thoughtful now and Kuroren hoped that with some of his fears laid to rest, he might act more kindly toward his mistress.

-X-X-X-

Kagome had never been hung over, but she imagined it was the same kind of feeling she woke up with after a backlash as nasty as the one she'd taken last night, with the notable exception that her mouth never tasted funny. So, when sunlight began to slant down into their nest in the snow, Kagome whimpered, nestling more snugly into whoever was holding her.

The sweet and clean scent proclaimed it to be Sei, as did the hard chest beneath his soft robes. Aki and Kuroren were firm, but the flat planes of Sei's skin just didn't give properly, for it was really just scales in better disguise than the glittering ones that were obvious on his forearms and beneath his eyes.

He hummed, deep in his chest, the vibration soothing away part of her headache. "Today the weather will be pleasant," he murmured. "The air tastes like sunlight."

Kagome giggled, for Sei was more reliable than any meteorologist when it came to weather. The noise and the slight movement awakened Aki, who tightened his hold around her waist, burying his nose further in her hair, closer to the base of her neck.

"You aren't in as much pain," he murmured. "That's good. This way you can enjoy it when I retaliate against the mouthy half-breed."

"Leave Inuyasha alone," Kagome said automatically, but the words were barren of power.

"I think not. He insulted _you_, which, as a shiki, is an indirect way of insulting _me._"

Kagome huffed, thinking that if Inuyasha wanted to abuse him, he would have done it directly. After all, there didn't seem to be a power in this world, short of Kikyo herself, that could curtail his foul mouth. And Kikyo was long dead now.

"So, what do you think?" the kitsune asked in a conspiratorial tone. "What does he like least? Spiders? Reptiles? Fleas?"

Kagome shuddered at the mention of spiders. "Nothing with too many legs, please."

"Alright. I'll save those for when you can't see," Aki replied agreeably.

"Kitsune should go down in history as the biggest squanderers of power ever. Complete mastery over illusion and what do you do with it? Play pranks and steal things. It's shameful," she teased.

"As you haven't _let _me borrow things since I entered your service, you don't know what manner of curiosities one might come upon. I am a connoisseur of this material world-something a short-lived ningen can't truly appreciate, giving the limited scope of your life and the shallowness of your senses. But, speaking of those senses," and his voice switched from humorous teasing to a teasing of a very different kind, "shall I baffle them for you now?" He'd leaned up a little so he could whisper the last into her ear.

Kagome laughed and swatted him away, ready to face another day. The thought brought a tolerant smile to her face. By now, Inuyasha would be regretting the nastiest of his words, but in lieu of an apology, he would make up for it with his gruff kindness.

One of which, she noted with surprise as she rose and took in the angle of the sun, was that he'd allowed her to sleep in. Helping her shiki to put away their bedding, she scurried to join the rest of the camp, some part of her that was constantly comparing herself to Kikyo afraid that he had decided an unstable miko wasn't a fit traveling companion and had left her. She was relieved to find that wasn't the case.

In fact, Sango's children were still sleeping, though the slayer herself waved a cheerful hello from where she was supervising the roasting of some freshly caught fish, swatting away the questing fingers of Shippou, whose clawed fingers afforded him some protection from the heat.

"They're not even done," she told him.

The fox kit scowled, then brightened at the sight of Kagome. Relief, instant and overwhelming, flowed through her as she opened her arms and Shippou scampered into them, without any indication of fear.

"That was so cool!" he declared, then balanced on her elbow to peer at Aki. The older kitsune's brow rose and Shippou turned back to face her. "Do you have any idea how strong a kitsune has to be to create solid illusions?" he demanded. "Most of the teachers at the school can't even do it! Is he _really _your shiki?"

"Yes, Aki is really my shiki," she assured him.

Shippou's features drew together as he considered this. "Because it's one thing to boss around Inuyasha, but he'd an _eight-tails._" People in her time reserved that tone of voice for business magnates and nobility.

"He was a very _naughty _eight-tails," Kagome confided. "Who was caught for me by a very, very powerful dog."

"Stronger than Sesshomaru?" Shippou wanted to know.

"Well, stronger in a different way," Kagome answered him cagily.

"And he gave him to you?"

"_She _gave-and it's rude to talk about Aki like he isn't here. No matter youkai protocol about shiki," she said sternly.

"Yes, Kagome." He peeked around her arm again. "What did you do? And why did you let the dog catch you?"

Aki sniffed haughtily. "I did not _let _Chiaki-sama catch me. But, trust me, the Great White Bitch can run anyone to the ground, given proper incentive. I just didn't think her the sentimental type."

"Sentimental?" Shippou prompted.

"Yes," Aki replied dryly. "As in, anything she has ever owned, no matter how large or small or how many decades has passed since she has last seen it, it is still dear and precious to her heart."

A/N: Just as a note, when anyone other than Kagome talks about the west, they are talking about mainland China, Korea, and associated islands. Japan is still a nation in relative isolation-no Perry and the black ships yet and no Silk Road or spice trade, just the necessary Jesuits to introduce guns so that Nobunaga can revolutionize battle in Japan by creating an armed peasant infantry. However, I find that whole slice of history where the gun trumps the sword very depressing, so you won't see much sign of it here, though I'm uncertain what specific year Inuyasha is set in. So, therefore, no Europeans.


	5. Progress of an Acquaintanceship

Disclaimer: The Usual.

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter Five-

The Progress of an Acquaintanceship

"So where exactly are we going?" Kagome prompted, briskly combing out her hair and snapping the comb across Aki's knuckles as he attempted to usurp the duty. "We're not going all the way to Hokkaido, are we?"

Inuyasha was watching their actions with a kind of wary interest, especially when Aki gave up and began fussing with his own hair, as if to demonstrate to Kagome just what she was missing. "No," he told her eventually, when he realized she was still waiting on an answer. "We're going to stay on the main island. It's close to Hirosaki."

Kagome frowned. "What was Rin doing that far north? I mean, is that even considered the Western lands?" She turned to Sesshomaru, who remained had remained on the fringes of the camp, within sight and easy hearing range, but not so close that a passerby might mistake him for actually belonging to the ragtag little group. It made Kagome smile, but she grew more serious as she reflected how poorly he'd taken her last accusation of being standoffish. Though the way she'd phrased it might have had something to do with that.

"No. Though the Sky-Crowned King rules Hokkaido, that tip of the island was lost by my father's foolishness. North of Akita it becomes unsafe for the unwary traveler," Sesshomaru replied, his tone indicating that the loss of land would one day be rectified.

Kagome, though she didn't know all of the castle-towns, was familiar enough with Sengoku Jidai geography and youkai political territories to know that they could be separated into the four main islands with some accuracy. Sesshomaru was lord of Honshū, the largest and most populous island, though encroachment during the night of his father's death meant that his hold on his borders was not absolute. Sekishi ruled to the north, while the wolves with their Waxing and Waning Lords warred among themselves for Shikoku and made raids into the Western Lands as their expansive packs sought new territory, the Sun-Fang of the neko making certain that Kyūshū remained the exclusive preserve of the loosely grouped collective of felines, while ignoring the territorial rights of all the other powers.

Kagome could see where a castle in the sky might be appealing. And why Sesshomaru was so focused on conquest. For if he hadn't been, it seemed likely that the young ruler would have had his kingdom torn apart, like meat stolen for a still-warm carcass.

"But Rin isn't really an unwary traveler," Kagome pointed out, "And why weren't either of you with her?"

Inuyasha answered her. "She was on pilgrimage with a buncha other spiritualists-and ya can't just drag along demons to something like that," he ended quietly, ears drooping.

Kagome blinked and was about to point out that _she _dragged youkai along for just about anything, but she recalled just in time that she was the very definition of deviation from normal and the spiritualists she'd met recently had disliked her even more intensely than the demons. _Good for you, Rin, _she thought wistfully, wondering for a moment what it might have been like to live out the rest of her life in the village with Inuyasha.

_Warm, _she knew, but also-and this made her feel guilty-_dull? Uncomfortable? _Kagome, for all the things she missed in the modern world, knew that the conveniences she'd always taken for granted like running water, central air, and plumbing shouldn't really make that big a difference to her, but they did. She tried very hard not to think of the _people_ she'd left behind, but _things _were different. And a palace full of magic and youkai was the furthest thing from a dirt-floored hut imaginable.

Shaking off her thought, she returned to the conversation at hand. She shouldn't let herself be so easily distracted by something she had accepted as reality long ago, but being in the company of her old friends was dredging up memories. "So she was with other spiritualists? Were they affected as well?"

"Not all of them have been found. And those who were were not whole," Sesshomaru answered.

"Metaphorically or literally?" Kagome asked, garnering a curious look from Inuyasha. "I mean, was there any evidence of a physical attack?"

Sesshomaru shook his head and Kagome frowned. "Well, that might be...problematic," she said.

Sango apparently concurred. Silent until now, the slayer asked, "So, how do you intend to search for it? If it's range is limited, it's feasible we might be able to search it thoroughly enough to root out its lair, but does it even have a lair? All we know is that its victims disappear and reappear in extreme emotional distress, but that's not much of a lead. We can't just wander blindly and hope something pounces." Though her eyes did slide to Kagome, who made a face at her friend. Five or six kidnappings and innumerable sneak attacks did _not _mean she was a magnet for trouble. With the elimination of the Jewel, the rate of incidents had dropped dramatically.

"You _do _have a plan, right?" Kagome asked Inuyasha.

"Course we have a plan," he grumbled.

Kagome understood immediately. "So Miroku has a plan." Because Inuyasha _never _did and Sesshomaru wouldn't bother to explain his until the last possible moment.

Miroku chuckled. "Yes, the plan was mine. Although many little details remain to be seen to. One of our major problems is that all the rumors that reach us here are either extremely vague or too outlandish to be believed, so I thought we might hunt rumors before we hunt the beast that created them."

"In human settlements?" Kagome asked.

"Not only them, but among the local youkai as well."

Sango nodded. "I've heard there's a colony of tengu living around Mt. Shiroji."

"The Greater Court of the Moon is at Mt. Iwaki. I've never met Tadashinori-sama, but he might offer us aid," Kagome volunteered. "I mean, this has got to be a headache for him as well."

She glanced at Kuroren for confirmation, but he only looked thoughtful. Though she was more often on the receiving end of inuyoukai-style attentions, she knew her role as a good packmate and gestured for him to sit, so she could comb out his hair, which was one of the least embarrassing gestures of gratitude that she'd learned.

But her friends were nothing if not adaptable, so it was only Sango's children who stared, and she not so subtly _thwacked _them upside the head to remind them of their manners.

Sango turned to Miroku then. "We can cover more ground if we split up, but then we run the risk of someone disappearing," she observed.

The monk nodded, short ponytail bobbing. "Indeed. I think until we have a better idea of just who is being targeted, we might wish to stay together."

"Keh," Inuyasha said, "Lose your backbone while you were out "training"?"

Miroku smiled serenely at the hanyou. "No, I did not. Just as you appear to have never acquired good sense."

"Tch. I don't see why we have to skulk around," the hanyou complained. "Unless you don't think you can take the bastard."

"Inuyasha," Sango said, exasperated, "it could be a whole group of youkai. Youkai who were confident enough to take on a whole group of monks and miko," she pointed out when Inuyasha looked like he might protest again.

Kagome knew better than anyone that most of his impatience was born from worry and she tried to soothe that fear, even as she ran her fingers through the long, silky waves of Kuroren's hair, pulling back the top part of it. "Inuyasha, we'll stop it from doing to others what it did to Rin-and then we'll make certain it won't do it again," she said lightly, running her thumbnail lightly over the sensitive skin behind Kuroren's ear, where the tip of one dark marking peeked out from beneath his mane.

"Keh," Inuyasha said roughly, but she could tell he was pleased by her assurance. "So, your little grooming ritual done? Because we need to leave," he said.

"Just one minute," Kagome replied. "Shippou?"

The little kitsune looked at her curiously.

She held up the comb and understanding lit in his green eyes. "Really?" he inquired.

"Really." She felt a little guilty for neglecting her kit, but she had been unsure how to approach him. After all, what if he hadn't wanted to be babied anymore? Especially in front of strangers? But it seemed her concerns had been in vain, he submitting happily to her care.

-X-X-X-

Shippou happily perched on the shoulder of _his _Kagome.

Three years was little enough time for a youkai like him, but he'd known that three years was a monumental stretch of time for a human. And so much of the external Kagome had changed, he had almost despaired at the parts that made Kagome _Kagome _remaining as he remembered them.

After all, hadn't she replaced them? Instead of a foul-mouthed hanyou, she was tended by a silky, soft-spoken inu-youkai who radiated understated power. Instead of a little fox-kit like him, she had the most extravagant, extraordinary _eight-tails_. No little illusions for him, no, this was the kind of kitsune that could turn a small army into a flock of birds to travel through enemy territory safely. He was _that _kind of power, which Shippou would eventually gain, but he did not have _now. _Even Kirara had been replaced-with a dragon, no less!

And she'd been so at ease with them, had actually allowed the inu to be inu, when she would have sat Inuyasha until the rosary broke or the hanyou gave up the ghost.

She'd been self-assured, powerful, everything that his Kagome had been, but more. So much more. But then she'd lost control of that power and, rather than feeling frightened as she obviously feared, he felt reassured. This was still the clumsy, trouble-attracting, oft-meddling miko he had come to regard as his adoptive mother.

Even if he now had to share her with even more people. But he didn't think they were _bad_, necessarily, though he was pretty certain Kagome didn't get how scary her new dog was. Though he didn't seem to be any danger to the miko, Shippou was pretty certain he thought of the rest of them as just so much extra baggage. He would only move to protect them if Kagome forced him to. Kinda like Sesshomaru did with Rin.

And her ryuu-Shippou didn't trust his docility, which translated into an almost total absence of personality. Sure, he was a greater dragon, who were famed for their sage-like natures, but he was also a _winter _dragon, which meant his base nature was the antithesis of warm and fuzzy.

Aki was almost too cool for words, but he was a _court kitsune. _Forest kitsune like Shippou might play tricks on travelers, but kitsune like Aki started entire wars in the human world, enchanting ningen rulers to be pliant to their whims. They were petty when thwarted, self-absorbed at the best of times, and could be really, really nasty when it suited them, capable of the level of psychological warfare Naraku himself had practiced.

That being said, he wondered how to ask Kagome to have her shiki teach him. She would probably tell him that Aki was just over there, but sometimes Kagome just didn't _get_ how things worked in this time. Aki was her property now, eight tails or not, so his tricks and knowledge were also hers. Learning them from him without Kagome's permission was pretty much the equivalent of stealing.

But if he phrased it casually, while Kagome wasn't in a reflective mood, she might say yes without thinking about why she had to say yes.

His plotting was interrupted when the ride of his ride spoke. "When this turns into a hunt, do you intend to summon Karakurenai?" the dusky voice phrased it without much emphasis, but Shippou, from his perch on Kagome's shoulder, felt the faint shudder that ran through her.

"Only as a last resort," she murmured. "I'll depend on Sesshomaru's goodwill first."

"Who's Karakurenai?" Shippou asked, tail flicking in curiosity. He knew the name referred to a very specific shade of red, but it still wasn't much clue to his identity.

"He's the last of my shiki."

"Oh. Why didn't you bring him with you?"

"Because I...had him taking care of something else."

He doesn't have to be a youkai to hear the hesitation in that answer.

-X-X-X-

She has been perfectly polite and not spoken to him for the two days of travel it takes for the unbearably slow ningen to reach the shadow of the Greater Court of the Moon, insistent as they are on stopping at every village or habitation along the way to ask for tales of recent disappearances.

It is apparently unbearable torture. It is as if she cannot conceive the thought that someone would not want to be spoken to. In fact, he has a deep suspicion that she thinks she might be _hurting his feelings_ by not doing so.

If she does not stop talking, he might have to reassure her in the plainest way possible that if he even has such feelings, she is in no way affecting them by her guilty silence.

She has been asking him questions about his uncle and he has been ignoring them. If she wishes for information, she has her own loyal inu to appeal to.

"Sesshomaru, are you even listening to me?" she demands, hands on her hips, leaning slightly forward as if to invade his personal space.

"This Sesshomaru could hardly avoid hearing you," he replies dryly.

"Uh-huh. And while hearing me, did you happen to be listening to the words that were coming out of my mouth?"

Kuroren has the patience of a practiced assassin. Sesshomaru wonders if it isn't possible for the miko to have a tragic accident while on this trip. _No, _he decides after a moment. There is no one skilled at assigning blame like his mother; the miko could be halfway across Japan and his mother would say some like, "Who drove her there? Wasn't it you, Sesshomaru? And if she hadn't been there, she'd still be alive, wouldn't she?"

"It's a simple question, Sesshomaru. What's Tadashinori-sama like?" Almost as if she would change that wretched personality of hers to suit his uncle.

"He is the Yama-ou," he told her shortly. "Like this Sesshomaru's honored mother, he is used to doing things in his own time."

"Is that why he hasn't taken your land back from the dragons?" the miko asked curiously.

"After this dishonor of this one's mother, he will lend no aid to even the memory of Inu no Taishou. And it is this Sesshomaru's land to take."

She blinked and seemed to accept that information. "Okay." She glanced at the approaching mountain. "We'll be there by midmorning, right? When do you expect his patrols to confront us?"

Sesshomaru shrugged, little caring, for it would depend largely on his uncle's mood. He was grateful when the miko dropped back, exchanging words with her retainers. There seemed to be some sort of agreement, for she shouted something about returning shortly before they all disappeared.

It is only when the monk whistled some kind of catcall that ends in a cry of pain that he realizes she has returned and not only has her contingent put away their traveling clothes, she suddenly smelled like his mother.

"I didn't realize you were carrying the clothing for a formal court audience in that bag of yours," the dark-haired human teased.

The miko scowled. "You have no idea how often this happens," she grumbled, pulling at a sleeve made of fine, thick silk, his mother's crest woven tastefully into the fabric, white on white, because for all the fineness of her clothes, she was still dressed as a miko. He observed that the scent of his mother emanated from the winter weight haori that replaced her bear pelt, the garment obviously woven of his mother's fur. It was a sign of favor, but also of possession. It was certain to garner his uncle's attention. "Eventually, I got tired of fulfilling the dirty human insult. There's nothing like road dust to make a girl feel shabby in front of a youkai court."

He also noted how careful the miko was not to let the haori come into contact with her skin. Sesshomaru was faintly curious to know if the lingering youki would provoke another loss of control, but his curiosity was ruled by his impatience to begin the hunt. He could not shake the feeling that every day that passed with his foe unchecked was a direct insult to Rin and therefore to him.

"Spider innards," her kitsune contested, "are worse than dust. They _stain._" He normally wore all the colors of an autumn forest upon his multi-layered kimono, as if he were the princely master and it should be the miko who followed him, not the other way around, but he and the dragon both were clad in stark red and white, like the aftermath of a battle in winter.

He wondered if his half-brother realized that he also wore the miko's colors, proclaiming him to be as the others were: extensions of her will. Kuroren was a noted exception, his clan's colors still apparent, but in Sesshomaru's opinion it was an unintentional lie, for it was clear that it pleased the black inu to align himself with the human.

A foul-mouthed extension, he thought with irritation as Inuyasha made a nasty comment about the addition to the miko's scent. "You smell like dog," he complained.

Kagome scoffed. "So do you. At least I don't smell like _unwashed _dog," she said. "Water won't make you melt, Inuyasha."

"Hey!" Inuyasha barked at her, "I was just trying to tell ya that going in like that is pretty much a declaration you belong to that bastard's mother." He had the gall to jab his thumb at Sesshomaru's person in emphasis.

Kagome rolled her eyes. "Yes. Which, technically, isn't exactly _wrong . _I belong to her in the same way the Minister of the Right belongs to the Emperor, not the way the Emperor owns a screen. But so long as Chiaki-sama and I both realize that, whatever outsiders choose to think doesn't bother me a whit. Not that I expect to have any trouble with Tadashinori-sama." A little more sprightliness entered her step. "In fact, I'm _hoping,_"and Sesshomaru was certain that emphasis was directed at him, "that he tends toward Yorokobi-sama."

Sesshomaru allowed a faint scowl to crease his features. "Yorokobi is a disgrace who tries too hard to live up to the promise of his name."

"As if _that _doesn't run in your family," Kagome said lightly.

"Who's Yorokobi?" Inuyasha asked suspiciously.

"Sesshomaru's other uncle. He's wonderful. He's exactly the opposite of Sesshomaru."

That was clearly baiting him, but Sesshomaru did not deign to reply, for fear he would encourage the miko. Luckily, he could already scent the approach of Tadashinori's guards.

Kuroren whispered that news to the miko, who only nodded in a complacent way, either out of lack of worry or having already sensed them herself Sesshomaru could not say. The two inu-youkai guards were stern-faced, but the miko met them with composure.

Inclining her head just the fraction of an inch that acknowledged their presence while indicating her own superior standing-his amber eyes narrowed as he realized the further substance of Kuroren's whispers, the black inu feeding to her the information he'd gathered from their scent about their relative standing in Tadashinori's pack, something that would be obvious to inu immediately but not to a ningen-she spoke, in more formal language than he'd ever before heard issue from her lips.

"The scion of the West demands an audience with the faithful vessel who dwells in the splendor of the moon's light, upon what the humans call Mt. Iwaki. Will your alpha submit?"

Their glances darted to Sesshomaru, to his markings, but they did not let the miko go unchallenged. The smaller of the two asked, "Who are you to make demands on the behalf of the Lord of the West, ningen?"

That was an excellent question. Unfortunately, he expected the miko would be able to frame a tolerable answer, which was a pity. Because that put her in the position of spokesperson, able to control the flow of conversation as _she _wanted, all in Sesshomaru's name. For once in his long life, Sesshomaru regretted not having spoken first.

"This humble miko is pleased to be in service to Her Grace Among the Clouds, the Lady of the Western Lands. It is through her that this small one offers what little help she is capable of in the absence of the Western Lord's page, who you may note is absent upon matters of great import to the security of this land."

It was as pretty a speech as any given by the gilded tongues of the court youkai, managing in a few sentences to impart a feeling of both pressing need and her own prestige, despite the self-effacing titles she littered generously in her speech. _Canny_, Sesshomaru realized, _and experienced. I though this one's mother might have indulged her pet, but it seems she made the ningen follow protocol. _

He almost growled as he saw the inu-youkai take her words to heart, beckoning for them to follow. They would not be shown directly to his uncle-he had called himself enough times on this mountain to know they would be conducted to one of the many rooms equipped to receive guests and would there wait for the petty king to deign to visit them. And once left to their own devices, away from the listening ears of his uncle's retainers, he intended to speak to the miko about usurping the initiative.

-X-X-X-

Sango was hard-pressed to keep from laughing as the door shut behind the servant who'd shown them in and the latent spell to assure the privacy of noble visitors-something unique to the inu courts-unfurled, sealing the space. Sesshomaru was actually _glowering _at Kagome, who looked very pleased with herself.

She'd seen Kagome keep Inuyasha on his toes for years, but the time she'd spent among youkai had advanced her brazenness to a new level. Sango would not go so far as to say that Kagome had ever been afraid of Sesshomaru, except on those semi-regular occasions where he attempted to murder his half-brother and Kagome interfered, but she was almost certain that the Kagome of three years ago would have first needed her temper roused-and she wouldn't have couched her replies in ways certain to annoy, but in themselves not something that could be acted against.

"I was only trying to be of aid to you, Sesshomaru-sama," Kagome told the daiyoukai sweetly. "After all, I've realized on our journey here what a heavy burden conversation is to you. And, being Lord of the Western Lands and missing your usual go-between, I couldn't _inconvenience_ you by making you speak to such lower beings. In fact, I will do my very best to make sure you don't need to speak at all."

Not everyone had such diligent control of their mirth: Inuyasha and Miroku were shaking with silent laughter, the kitsune were grinning, and even Noboru had a slight, shy smile on his face. Asuka, as per usual, only looked grim, her lips pressed together so hard it made her scar stand out all the more. She'd been darting harried glances at their surroundings since they'd been conducted into the Greater Court. Sango imagined she was disappointed not to find human skeletons on display or corpses in the corridors, but it was for this sort of experience that she had brought her young charges.

Noboru needed to overcome his fear and Asuka her hate. Without that accomplishment, all the physical prowess in the world could only be misused.

"Miko." Sesshomaru managed to squeeze an entire blizzard into the two syllables, but it did not dim Kagome's provokingly sunny disposition.

"Yes, Sesshomaru-_sama_?"

"My honored mother forbid you from providing this Sesshomaru aid," he finally bit out.

"So she did," Kagome agreed. "But I'm not actually aiding you, per se, so much as replacing Jaken. It would doubtless be a crushing blow to him if you were troubled by his absence, so you may look on it as a kindness done to a kappa, nothing more."

The daiyoukai's eyes narrowed, but then he seemed to relax, perhaps sensing that Kagome, in her own way, was more implacable than anyone Sango had ever known. "Your tongue will land you in trouble one day, miko."

"Yes, well," Kagome said with a smile, "that really wouldn't be much of a change of pace." Then she sobered. "Overlooking the fact that I'm railroading you into this, are there questions you'd like me to ask, Sesshomaru? This will be a formal audience, right?"

Sesshomaru tilted his head, as if he was considering, then to Sango's astonishment, the inu-youkai and her friend began to lay out their strategy, with only the very occasional veiled insult.

In Kagome's campaign for friendship everywhere she went, it could almost be viewed as progress.

A/N: Yes, there's a different political system in place than in The Bone Eater. Because I enjoy making up that kind of thing. Now that the dynamics have been established, the plot just might advance. Maybe.

In response to the guest reviewer who wanted me to tell her/him (though I don't know how, as it was an unsigned review) that I wouldn't possibly be so cruel as to make Kagome live without a child of her own: The sum of a woman is not her biological function. And, besides, we're over 99% genetically identical-and the remaining fraction of a percent isn't something you can take out and admire, checking to see that this chromosome or that one looks just like Uncle Ted's-family isn't something defined by blood, it's something created in the heart. So, as far as I am concerned, Kagome and Sesshomaru both already _have _children of their own. (Note: This review was on , Dokuga readers ignore this, please.)


	6. The Court of the Mountain King

Disclaimer: If I were the original author, you would be reading this in Japanese. In manga format. You don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to solve this case.

A/N: I am very pleased that no one seems to have a problem with my inclusion of OCs. I hope I have managed to blend them fairly seamlessly into the scenery, but I also hope that you maybe-sorta enjoy them as well. I certainly do, especially when they're irritating Sesshomaru. Just a warning now, if you haven't figured it out already, if you're reading this for a quick romance between Kagome and Sesshomaru, you're in for a long, long wait. Because I feel Sesshomaru's character wouldn't do it any other way. And, well, harassing him is immense fun.

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter Six-

The Court of the Mountain King

Tadashinori-sama smelled like mountain pine, strong and pungent as she pressed her nose just behind his ear, latching down on her powers with a prayer to the kami that she wouldn't accidently return more power than was strictly polite in such a greeting. His youki made the point of contact tingle as he returned the favor, snuffling politely so that his breath fanned her hair. It was a warm and pleasant gesture that made her smile faintly as she sat back on her heels and then shuffled backwards on her knees to obtain the proper distance.

"My sister has trained you well," the inu youkai observed, after a great deal of words that were mostly empty phrases of courtesy were exchanged, none as important as the first greeting of scent. Tadashinori resembled his sister and her son only superficially. Broader and more powerfully built than Sesshomaru, he also lacked the distinctive amber eyes that seemed a common trait among the inu daiyoukai. His were captivatingly ianthine, a pure and entrancing purple that complimented the golden moon he bore on his brow. His kimono was dyed with night, deepest midnight blue lightening to warm violet at the hem. It was unpatterned, but the striking contrast it made with his shimmering white hair was pattern enough. His obi too, seemed unpatterned gold at first glance, but a careful study of the fabric at an angle would reveal the pattern was in the weave itself, in a stylized pattern that represented waves.

"My honored lady has done much to improve upon this humble miko," Kagome acknowledged. "This reverent one has much still to learn."

Tadashinori's eyes traveled over her shoulder, where the others were ranged along the wall on mats provided for their comfort. "If one judged what you wished to learn by the company you keep, I feel that I would perhaps be better prepared to receive you with a contingent of guards at my back." When he spoke, he did so using a formal pronoun, but he did not speak of himself in the third person.

Kagome was cautiously optimistic that by the end of their audience, she too could relax her formality. Speaking to him in such humble terms would only seem obsequious if he did not insist on such things, yet, like Chiaki, he might allow himself indulgences in manners that he found unacceptable in others. "What kind of trouble brings two inu daiyoukai, a miko, a kitsune, an inu hanyou, a monk, and a demon slayer and her disciples to my door?" He did not mention her shiki, though they sat in a row midway between her own position and the others at the wall. Like all servants, they were invisible to the eyes of power, though they sat closer to the Mountain King than even the inu daiyoukai.

Kagome described the situation that had brought them to the Greater Court of the Moon with as much clarity and brevity as she was capable. It did not take long, for despite all their rumor-gathering, there were still fewer facts than outlandish rumors. When she had finished, Tadashinori looked thoughtful. "I understand. I have information that I might give you, but it will take some time to prepare it. You will spend the night on my mountain."

Kagome could almost feel Sesshomaru radiate displeasure, but schooled her expression to not express irritation at his impatience. Though she wasn't quite satisfied herself at the meandering path their investigation had taken, searching years for shards of the Jewel had taught her considerable patience. A lesson only reinforced by Chiaki-sama's court, where every inhabitant had, potentially, the rest of time to achieve their ends and seemed intent on filling up that empty time with speeches and rituals.

"Will you require comfort tonight?"

Kagome blinked as her brain processed the question. _Comfort of pack. _It was not an offer of sexual services, though Kagome had been appalled the first time she had heard it. Her mind had leapt to an erroneous assumption before she'd understood that sexual comfort, which took primacy in humans, was secondary to the comfort of den and pack, which was what inu believed a traveler was most in need of. She _had _been offered sex, notably among kitsune, but never among inu.

So, when receiving important guests, members of the court, preferably of the guest's own species, would share their room for the night. It was an antiquated practice no longer in vogue, so she had only received the offer once or twice from traditional inu trying to curry favor or have her introduce one of their progeny to Chiaki-sama. Wearing Chiaki-sama's scent elevated her to a person of enough importance to make the offer and to refuse when she had no formal pack of her own here would be impolite.

But she had apparently paused too long in her thoughts. "But perhaps you are here as my nephew's pack?" he inquired.

Kagome doubted that Sesshomaru's glare was actually poisonous, but she could feel it boring into her back. So she smiled and inclined her head as she replied, "It would be this humble miko's honor to share comfort with your pack tonight, Tadashinori-sama."

She made a mental note to "accidentally" scorch Sesshomaru's mokomoko the next time she had opportunity. Tadashinori had provided her with a perfectly polite reason to decline while saving face, but Sesshomaru's complex about being sullied by association with humans prevented her from voicing it even as a lie. _I'll bet he never did this to Rin, _Kagome grumbled mentally. Of course, she also could not imagine Sesshomaru ever having to extract his ward from this kind of situation, which seemed particularly Kagome-ish in its irony.

Tadashinori nodded, an almost invisible inclination of his head. "I will give orders to have rooms prepared. Until then, consider yourselves at liberty upon my mountain."

Going through the closing pleasantries by rote, Kagome sourly anticipated another confrontation with Sesshomaru. But it never materialized, Sesshomaru lingering behind to confront his uncle while the others were left to explore the mountain. And Kagome's heart soared, because youkai strongholds were the very reality that had inspired so many stories among humans, both good and ill.

With quick steps, she eagerly followed the path one of the passing servants had recommended, steps worn, not carved into the side of the mountain taking her past natural terraces upon which grew bent and gnarled trees, dwarfed by the cold and wind and lack of soil, but more fascinating for all that. She carefully avoided the runnels of tiny streams that would widen with the spring melt, forging ahead as the wind grew chillier and nipped rosiness into her cheeks.

What had begun as a system of natural caves had been hollowed out by the acid-inu over the course of almost a thousand years until they had built an intricate stonework palace incomparable to anything ever made by human hands. Having once been an active volcano, now long dormant, their halls glittered darkly with obsidian, but not all was dark-clever inu of the past had diverted the natural flow of subterranean water into their home, waiting patiently as the calcium in the water turned their walls white.

Heat was naturally provided, rising from the lower halls into the upper through vents dug into the stone, down to where the magma still boiled. Kagome had been cautioned away from these vents as she'd begged a quick tour after her audience, for the steam that came off the liquid rock was poisonous to humans, though it boasted recuperative properties for the inu of the court.

"Carefully," Kuroren chided from behind her, but Kagome only laughed, knowing her feet were much surer than they had once been. And even if they failed her, she had three youkai to catch her before she offered a painful greeting to the mountain.

Breathing hard, she almost couldn't make out Aki's grumbling as they finally crested the last rise and she spotted their destination. The servant had called it the mountain chair and Kagome had expected something subdued, such as an outcropping of rock that offered a view of the land below.

It _was_, technically speaking, an outcropping of rock, of the same sharp, shining, brittle material that lined the palace's inner rooms. And it _did _face a spectacular panorama of the snowy world below. But there was nothing simple about it. Spreading behind the seat like the fan of a peacock were reliefs of what, even to Kagome eyes, must have been the great battles of the House of the Moon, featuring heavily the elongated bodies of dragons, curling through the cloudscape. Superimposed of all of this hung a full moon, of beaten gold, roughly two foot or more in diameter.

_This wasn't a chair. This was a throne, _Kagome thought with awe.

Kuroren was at her shoulder. "In the Greater Court of the Moon, each member of the ruling line is required to make a pilgrimage here once a year. For the three days of the full moon in the month they have chosen, they will not leave this spot, neither eating nor drinking. It is to remind them, that though they have gained this palace, it is kept through sacrifice. They turn their gaze to the land below, which is theirs to rule-but also theirs to protect." He cocked his head to one side, as if he was listening to something upon the wind, but then his crimson eyes met hers.

Kagome was startled when Aki draped himself over her shoulders, breaking the mood. "You know you want to sit in it," he urged, a charismatic grin urging her on to mischief.

She prodded him in the gut with her elbow. "Were you not listening? Sacred, solemn rituals, deserving of the respect of us lowly outsiders?"

Aki snorted. "Uh-huh. Right." She could feel his tails twitch. "Kagome-sama...," he whined.

"No. Absolutely not. And you're not to sit in it either," she commanded briskly. She repressed her own curiosity and temptation, for they rarely led her places she wished to go.

"Higurashi-sama," Kuroren said, drawing her attention, "there is no vigil this month. During this time, all the members of the Court of the Moon are welcome to sit here, for all share the burden of war."

Before Kagome could express much of anything, Aki was prodding her forward, almost causing her to stumble. She wasn't able to do much more than blink before she was before the throne and, with a flare of showmanship worthy of the stage, Aki produced her black fur seemingly from thin air and spread it over the seat. "Sit," he instructed and Kagome rolled her eyes, obeying the eager kitsune's command.

She shrieked as cold mountain air touched her in places where it most certainly _should not_, then shivered as silky garments settled against her skin, void of the body heat that had seeped into her previous garments. "Aki!"

The kitsune laughed. With another flare of illusionary magic, he and Sei took on the appearance of inu-youkai, Aki's tails disappearing and Sei's scales replaced by soft fur. The dragon, whose expression was normally so impassive, became alert and curious as he played with the fur that flowed over his shoulder, inspecting Aki's flawless transformation.

Aki, who was a flamboyantly red-haired inu for the moment, his outfit approaching imperial China's level of gaudy, preened and posed for her, using his fluffy mokomoko like a boa. Kagome tried very hard to maintain a serious and disapproving expression, but her lips kept trying to twitch upward into a smile."You're shameless," she managed.

Aki sniffed, flicking one end of his mokoboa at her. "Shame is a learned reaction, not a natural one," he retorted tartly. "Kitsune know better."

"I stand corrected," Kagome said dryly. "Kitsune are philosophers of great merit, learned and wise in the ways of the world, while the rest of us cower under the burden of convention."

"I'm glad you have understood, Kagome-sama," Aki replied with mock seriousness.

A strong feeling of ire and youki was their first indication that they had an audience. Kagome sighed internally. _Sesshomaru. _

-X-X-X-

"You are not taking this seriously, miko," Sesshomaru charged, irritation coursing through his veins as he glared at the human currently cloaked in illusion. While Rin suffered, here the miko was, making a mockery of one of the House of the Moon's oldest and most venerable rituals with the help of her shiki.

The illusion was masterful, he grudgingly admitted, fooling not only the eyes, as the young kit's often did, but also replicating the scent of a female inu with such thoroughness that Sesshomaru suspected was the result of much carousing in inu courts, for kitsune had weaker olfactory senses than did inu. But though he had changed her clothes and scent, the female sitting in the mountain chair was obviously the miko.

Kitsune appealed to the senses. The miko's shiki had gifted her with all the points most desirable in a female inu: her claws tapered gracefully, black as suited her in her incarnation as a kuro-inu, without any white in them that would indicate stress points where they were fragile, her ears were well-formed and came to a desirable point, her hair was thick and lustrous, pooling in an inky puddle about her hips.

But her expression was that exasperated mix of lively rebelliousness and unwanted goodwill that made her uniquely herself, no matter then fineness of her-his mind took in the complex outfit that, like his own, was somehow delicately balanced between armor and formalwear, though the fox had taken some outrageous liberties-attire or the psuedo-scent the kitsune had invented.

At the moment, she was wearing an expression of low-key outrage. "I _am _taking this seriously, Sesshomaru," she protested. "But confronting Tadashinori-sama aggressively won't do any good."

Sesshomaru raised a brow, silently inquiring as to why she thought she knew his uncle so well, having had only one audience with the inu daiyoukai.

Kagome interpreted his expression quite accurately. "He is, after all, brother to Chiaki-sama. She _has _been known to find desperation funny."

He was forced to acknowledge that the miko did know his honored mother well, though it was somewhat disconcerting to realize that she also seemed quite fond of her, despite that knowledge.

"And _you_ have probably already discovered that, if you're here and not still in an audience with Tadashinori-sama," she concluded smugly.

Sesshomaru frowned faintly at the miko, then accused, "You deviated from the plan."

Kagome frowned at him. "A plan that cannot change to accommodate an opponent is a plan doomed to failure," she told him, brow furrowing, which drew his attention to the marking on her brow-not a crescent moon like he or his mother, but his uncle's full moon. "Sesshomaru, are you all right?"

Sesshomaru stiffened. "There is nothing wrong with this Sesshomaru," he snarled.

The miko blinked. "If you say so," she murmured, obviously unconvinced.

Again, Sesshomaru quashed the need to respond verbally to the miko. No longer could he excuse it as his worry for Rin or even as consideration to the ningen with her need for words. He had isolated the foreign energy, which had disguised itself as his own so cleverly he could no longer discern its source, but found he could not destroy it, not without considerable cost to himself, it having saturated a great part of his own youki. And he would not weaken himself before the hunt.

But if had grown so obvious that even the miko could notice, drastic measures might have to be taken.

-X-X-X-

Dressed only in thin sleeping garments, Kagome thought morosely that for all her complaints about Kuroren, Sei, and Aki, she hadn't had to be on her own for any length of time, even at night, for years. Thus, being left in a slightly chilly room, her shiki housed elsewhere, made her anxious. She found herself beset by both boredom and a faint sense of claustrophobia, though the room was quite spacious and set so near the outside she had but to open a set of doors into the outer room and then another set to have a view of the night sky that came highly recommended.

Kagome shivered, wishing for her companions. If she stretched out her senses, she could feel Aki and Sei and somewhere far away, a distance reflected upon with gratitude, Nai, as if they were extensions of herself. Nai's presence was a reminder, that she might someday soon have to recall him, which was something she looked forward to with only a little more enthusiasm than the possibility of surgery without anesthetic.

With only a little more effort, she discovered Kuroren, his room much deeper in the mountain, the palace operating on the same principle as a herd of yaks-the vulnerable pups and their dams were housed in the heart of the mountain, then the rooms of the unmated but mature inu youkai and the sires of said pups, then a band of what Kagome would call aristocracy, then, on the outskirts, just before the rooms were the guardians kept watch, were the rooms of the immense body of servants needed to keep the mountain functional.

Kuroren had been given a room in the second circle, while the rest of her friends were housed in the third, she discovered as she gently searched for them. She was startled back into awareness of the outer world as a door opened.

"You have not taken advantage of the view," Tadashinori's voice remarked. "May I open the doors?" Without waiting for a response, the inu daiyoukai padded softly past her, sliding both sets of doors open, the light of a waxing moon spilling into the room.

With no little sense of wonder, Kagome realized that it was not just any member of his pack that would be joining her. Tadashinori was clad only in a yukata and his own fur, white hair long and unbound, swaying softly as he gracefully joined her atop the thick futons that smelled like a herbal sachet.

"You seem surprised, Kagome-san," Tadashinori observed. "Surely you have received the same consideration from my sister."

"Ah, yes...," her voice trailed off, because Tadashinori had addressed her by her personal name, which meant she had to find a way to respond in kind without causing offense.

Tadashinori again proved himself unlike his sister and nephew. "You may call me Nori," he instructed, "while we are within this room."

"Nori-sama?" Kagome tried.

Tadashinori-Nori, nodded. "Just so. It is unseemly to allow over familiarity in an audience, but unlike my sister, I tire quickly of ceremony. But you are not here simply to address me by name. There is much I have to tell you and it was imperative that I take you somewhere beyond the hearing of invisible ears."

"Then you know...?" Kagome inquired eagerly.

"I have little love for the House of the West," Nori replied, meeting her gaze evenly. "Sesshomaru is an inu of honor, but a betrayal on the scale of his father is not easily forgiven and even less easily forgotten. It is an alpha's duty to protect his lands and all who owe allegiance to him-by his foolish actions, the General betrayed that sacred trust. When the dragons invaded, many of my own family died, as the Court of the Moon met them in battle, never allowing them to advance beyond our mountain. I sacrificed sons and daughters both for his damnable ningen concubine. And we white inu do not breed easily or well, the poison of a dam's womb making it inhospitable to her offspring and their own poison, if they are borne to term, making it unlikely more than one or two of a litter are not stillborn, killed by their siblings. Ningen love their children, yes?"

Kagome nodded mutely.

"Our love is different than yours. Your ningen love is narrow, carried by blood, but our love is broad, treasured by pack. My offspring had been part of my pack for over two hundred years, but mine were not the only ones lost. This mountain sorrowed for many seasons. Even now, we are not as we were. This is why I will not render service to Sesshomaru. My mountain is kept safe, but I have not the heart, even if I had the power, to take to the field to reestablish the border. But what is happening now is a threat to us all. So, through you, I will give my nephew the aid I cannot give him directly. Blood stands between us."

Kagome consulted her mental lexicon for the last phrase, which sounded familiar. _Blood stands between us. _After a moment, she finally recalled the incident, which had been a minor one. Sent by Chiaki-sama to investigate the disturbance, she had found two clans at war. They too had used that phrase, which meant, Kuroren had explained, that someone had sworn a blood oath at some point, which was generally done over the freshly spilled blood of a pack member and was witnessed by some kami or another. Breaking said oath generally had unpleasant consequences, even once anger had cooled and reason prevailed. Though it seemed that Tadashinori still did not regret his oath.

"Sesshomaru will join us, when he is ready," Tadashinori announced casually.

"Beg pardon?" Kagome's voice was a little shriller than usual and it made Tadashinori's lips twitch faintly.

"If he wishes to hear the information firsthand, he will do so in this room or not at all. It will take some time for him to overcome his inhibitions, but I have little doubt he will eventually join us. His inability to function in a pack is a great weakness, no matter his abilities with a sword. Chiaki worries for him."

Kagome felt the urge to defend Sesshomaru, to hold up his worry for Rin as an example, but she knew what the inu were looking for was not his fierce defense of his ward. While it _was _impressive that he'd claimed her in almost the same ways he would his own pup, the inu youkai were more interested in how he interacted with the mature members of his pack. Which consisted in entirety of one kappa and a lesser dragon. And anyone who had ever watched them interact would quickly realize that it was Jakken who made his relationship with Sesshomaru functional and Ah-Un's relation to the youkai lord was entirely utilitarian.

Still, she was somewhat skeptical that the touch-this-Sesshomaru-and-lose-said-sullying-fingers would join them, even for information. Kagome almost said as much to Tadashinori, but the youkai had risen from the futon, only to retrieve a long case, from which he produced a fue, a traditional Japanese flute. It wasn't until she heard its tone that she recognized it as ryūteki, a tone somehow both plaintive and transcendent.

And lonely, she realized, as the ryūteki was a traditional component of orchestral Gagaku, literally graceful music, that had been the standard for the imperial court after Chinese and Korean musical traditions were imported and assimilated during the Nara period. (She had lived on a shrine-that sort of information was eventually just absorbed by osmosis as they went through the seasonal cycle of festivals, something which she'd had to participate in, given that Grandpa was their only priest and her mother was not suitable for the role of miko.)

But Tadashinori played it well and Kagome shivered as the music reverberated within her. His ianthine eyes were sad, but not in an enraged or icy way. Compassion overflowed from them. _I know loss, _they said, _and so do you. In this, we are one. _

Kagome wouldn't be able to say later for how long he played until Sesshomaru opened the door and entered the room, but she began to understand how music would eventually come to be called the universal language. The music faded away and Tadashinori silently replaced the instrument. "I was entertaining my guest while we awaited you," he said to Sesshomaru, somehow managing to make it sound chiding. His eyes traveled back to Kagome and he frowned. "You are cold," he observed.

Kagome only became aware of it after he spoke and then she shivered. Indicating she should move, the elder inu youkai turned down the soft comforters, then with another gesture invited her onto the wide futon. In the Court of the Clouds she had seen entire rooms which could be converted into a futon by the simple measure of unrolling the huge roll of mattress that sat against a wall. This was not quite to that scale, but was plenty of room, which made it almost a deliberate insult as Sesshomaru sat with his back to the far wall, staring determinedly beyond them into the night.

Kagome found herself much warmer, but much less at ease with the covers pulled up to her waist. While Tashinori had reclined, propping him up on his elbow, she did not feel comfortable lying down while Sesshomaru managed to loom from the wall.

"You make your companion uncomfortable," Tadashinori observed. "Your mother did not raise you to be a neko, Sesshomaru. Get in bed."

Sesshomaru scowled at his uncle, but Kagome was silently awed as he actually did as he was instructed. Then she silently wriggled closer to Tadashinori and away from Sesshomaru as that glare was turned on her. More carefully, she slid under the covers and rolled onto her belly. It had been a learning process to learn how to manage the maneuver without her clothes riding up, but inu, even in their human form, did not like to sleep on their back, preferring to sleep either on their side, as Kuroren did, or on splayed face down on the futon, as Chiaki-sama did. So it always left Kagome with the surreal feeling that she should be lying on her bed at home, gossiping with girlfriends, whenever this situation occurred, rare as it was.

Then Tadashinori began without preamble, washing away all the pink-touched nostalgia. "The contamination is from the northeast. You are both familiar with the term kimon?"

"The gate in the northeast, from which both the kami and youkai enter," Kagome replied with some confusion. "It's an unlucky direction."

"Just so. It as if a great kimon has been opened in the northeast, letting in things that were expelled long ago. And when they come, they are dragged the confused remnants of the dead with them and adding the weak to their number. Madness comes when they march by. It's become a pandemonium parade," Tadashinori reported. "It touches both ningen and youkai-and it's contagious." His eyes bore into Sesshomaru's.

Kagome instantly understood what he was trying to imply. "You think Sesshomaru...caught it from Rin?"

"He controls it well, but today, during your audience, I was able to read your emotions on your face as well as your scent," he told Sesshomaru. "And until you find a way to close the gate, it will only grow more severe. You have no pack to protect you from your instincts, once they are roused. Until now, your antisocial nature could be overlooked, but now it will make you a danger. The parade stirs emotions, but you will allow it to enhance only the negative aspects of your character."

"And what would you suggest?" Sesshomaru bit out.

Tadashinori's hand rose to stroke Kagome's hair, pulling a hank of it toward him to investigate its scent. Kagome froze, though the gesture was familiar. "Your ward could potentially funnel your aggression into bonding, but if the reports I hear from the Western Fortress are true, you have taught her your own ways, not the ways of the inu."

Rubbing her hair between his fingers, Tadashinori continued, "You do, however, have one ally who is both familiar with the manners of inu and unlikely to turn what you will doubtless perceive as weakness against you. Someone with no interest in your lands or possessions. And someone who is unlikely to either misconstrue your intentions for anything more than they are or take advantage of your need."

"The miko?" he asked with unflattering surprise.

"I have a name," Kagome grumbled in a very low voice.

"You will not revert to bestial instinct today or tomorrow," Tadashinori informed him, "but if your quest does not succeed quickly, it _will _become an imperative. So I suggest that now, while you are still master of yourself, you learn to interact with Kagome-san as pack. For if you manage to win her loyalty, she is of the type that will also lend you the strength of her pack. And that is no small thing."

Kagome warmed at the compliment and only eeped faintly as Tadashinori's strong arm pulled her into his side. Realizing what he was doing, she crossed her arms in front of her so that she might lay her head on them more comfortably, turning to Sesshomaru so she could watch his appalled reaction through the strands of her hair, realizing how much more frightening it was to realize she could actually see it in his expression, just not to infer it from knowledge of his character. "I suggest," Tadashinori said firmly, "that you sleep on it."


	7. A Heart As Fragile As Abalone Shells

Where the West Wind Blows

-Chapter Seven-

A Heart as Fragile As Abalone Shells

Kagome woke feeling rested, though a bit suffocated from Nori-sama's closeness. His body temperature seemed higher than Kuroren's, the slight dampness of sweat on her skin making their scents stronger, his scent of pine partially obscuring the sharpness of purity. By midmorning it would fade, but for now she drew it in, feeling as if she were inhaling the peace of a mountain.

Turning her head, she peered at where Sesshomaru had been invited to sleep, but that section of the futon was empty. Struck by sudden curiosity, she wanted to know what scent Sesshomaru carried. Chiaki-sama's scent was sweet with the promise of bitterness, like an unripe pomegranate. All the inu she had met over a certain level of power had "cold" scents, unlike Aki, who smelled "warm." But Chiaki-sama spoke of her former mate as having a "warm" scent, thought Kagome couldn't imagine someone described as such a fearsome warrior as smelling of barley tea.

She tried to imagine a Sesshomaru that smelled like something so commonplace and conforting was forced to stifle a giggle in the soft material of the futon.

"Something amusing?" Nori-sama rumbled, shifting but not rising.

Kagome tried to phrase it diplomatically, but the giggling hindered her. "Just having a curious thought about Sesshomaru's scent. I happened to recall what Chiaki-sama had said about the Inu no Taisho."

Nori-sama chuckled. "That pup smells nothing like his sire. But I imagine that you'll become familiar with his scent soon enough," he remarked. "I was quite serious, young miko. I don't know the true form of those that began the parade, but they have already began to spread panic and chaos through the individuals they have abducted and released full of madness. With the humans so unsettled, war will follow. But you cannot let it spread to the youkai. One peasant with a grass knife cannot compare to a daiyoukai unleashed. Ningen already fear us. We need not provide them with a reason to attempt genocide. The land needs us both."

"Do you really think Sesshomaru will seek my aid?" Kagome inquired hesitantly. "I know he won't have many options, but we've a rocky history."

"It is his own fault that he has no one else to turn to," Nori-sama replied evenly. His nose was pressed gently behind her ear, clawed fingers idly brushing away her hair as he rose. Kagome half-rolled onto her side automatically, both so she could watch him more comfortably and because it was a gesture of friendly submission, like a pet rolling over to be petted.

"The sun hasn't risen fully yet," Nori-sama said, glancing out the still-open doors to the grey morning. "Would you like to watch the dawn? Or you may sleep for a while yet. Your journey after this will likely not allow you to rest so easily."

"Your fangs bring me great comfort," Kagome murmured. "Will you play, Nori-sama? Until the sun rises."

"Until the sun rises," he told her as he rose, "my time is yours, Higurashi Kagome. Spend it as you like."

And so, to the hollow, mournful sound of the flute, Kagome watched the dawn with the king beneath the Moon.

-I-I-I-

From a ledge just above where he'd lingered fitfully for most of the night, Sesshomaru listened with disdain as his uncle performed for Kagome. He'd fruitlessly attempted to meditate, but the restlessness in his soul had made it impossible. So Sesshomaru was left to watch as the sun tinted the clouds with streaks of orange and pink, listen as an old inu youkai and a young miko nursed a budding companionship, and worry ever more about Rin in the wake of his uncle's revelations.

Rin would not heal. Not until the source of the disturbance was destroyed. And neither was he, though he was not entirely convinced that he could not abandon this collective and destroy his prey before his own madness consumed him. But neither was he the fool his brother was. He knew well enough that hunting a parade of beasts that turned all who might testify against them into madmen would be difficult and perhaps time consuming, especially as the madness spread and made it harder to determine the epicenter of the event.

So, rather than idly away his time in frustration, he firmed his resolution. _The miko, _he thought silently, _at least has manners. Kagome-san, _he corrected himself internally. Though referring to one by their station was commonplace, what he required from her would build a degree of intimacy between them as she acted as the pack he had never desired. After watching what his father had done to his mother, he had known that betrayal could come as easily from those closest to one's heart and it would hurt all the more for the trust that had been placed in them.

And Sesshomaru was immaculate, invulnerable in battle, accepting only those who could be wholeheartedly loyal to him and him alone. After five centuries of life and decades as ruler of the largest island of Japan, his pack could be counted on a single hand.

Quashing his instinctive revulsion, he considered Kagome's pack. Kuroren claimed they were equals as betas, perhaps even believed it, but his behavior was deferential. Not to the degree of Jaken's groveling, but as a trusted and long-serving steward regards the master of a house. Feeling free to take some liberties, but always, buried deep, lurked the reminder of inequality. Which was ridiculous, as their positions were in different branches of his mother's court, Kuroren highly placed in her military, Kagome representing the whole of her religious observations, such as they were.

Though he felt uneasy about their relationship, Kuroren would be a useful ally. Her shiki were somewhat more worrying. Only an idiot gave full trust to a fox as old as Aki, daring enough to commit theft in his mother's court. And Sei-his very nonpresence was worrying. Dragons of the winter snows were not pack beasts, nor were they boon companions to creatures they would normally regard as little more than prey animals with the capacity for speech. Sesshomaru had not settled on what was the more disturbing possibility: that Sei was acting as he was for some reason that may or may not be nefarious, or that Kagome's immense powers had the capacity to change the very thought patterns of a creature until they suited her.

"Sesshomaru." His uncle's voice, spoken from below, turned his attention to the external world. "Break your fast with us." It was a command, not an invitation. Bristling slightly, Sesshomaru moved to comply, dropping lightly through the doors into the mountain.

He found the miko and his uncle already seated facing each other, servants waiting to place the small tables before them. The girl glanced up at him without surprise as he entered, her expression neutral, but her fingers kept tugging at her sleeves in small movements. His uncle's eyes met his golden ones in obvious challenge and Sesshomaru didn't flinch, crossing the room to seat himself next to Kagome.

Her eyes widened briefly, but it was a slight reaction, quickly stifled. _She is trying to make this easier to bear, _Sesshomaru realized.

As soon as he'd seated himself, they were served and the servants quickly and silently withdrew. Kagome and Sesshomaru both waited as Tadashinori prized a bit of flesh from his grilled fish. Staring blankly at his own meal, he attempted to map out a campaign in his head, this one a subtler kind of warfare than he was accustomed. Glancing upward, he noticed Kagome was not eating and was reminded that she was no ignorant partner. The fish was tasteless upon his tongue, but Kagome sent him a look of gratitude and seemed to enjoy the meal.

After they had finished eating in silence and more servants had silently taken away the dishes and tables, Tadashinori excused himself, leaving Sesshomaru and Kagome alone in the room. Kagome didn't quite meet his eyes. "You...are you alright?" she inquired tentatively. "I didn't want to doubt Nori-sama, but even though you've been acting a little _odd_-not that we've had much interaction outside of battle-I don't know that I'd exactly call it the prelude to madness." Her blue eyes met his then, full of hope.

Sesshomaru would have twitched his ears back, had he been in inu form. "This one's uncle was not mistaken," he told her bluntly after a long pause. "It would seem that cooperation with this Sesshomaru might be necessary to achieve a mutual goal. That is something familiar. Is this...agreeable?"

Kagome frowned slightly and shifted. Then she sighed. "Sesshomaru-sama, I will be open with you. I am accustomed, no matter your relationship with Chiaki-sama, to view you antagonistically when I think of you at all. I realize this is likely unfair to you, but when you first started helping against Naraku, I thought it to be a matter of personal revenge for trying to using you as a pawn, rather than through any altruistic motive."

"All altruism only conceals a selfish motive," Sesshomaru replied. "You did not think wrongly of this one."

Kagome forged ahead. "Well, whatever your reason, my first and foremost loyalty was to Inuyasha. My thinking was colored by his. And Inuyasha disliked you. Whether that was justified or not was irrelevant at the time."

"You thought yourself in love with the whelp," Sesshomaru acknowledged, hoping to avoid any discussion of such distasteful things.

"Yes," Kagome said, then obligingly left that avenue without expounding on the relationship he'd witnessed between them. Which had resembled in turns an alpha berating a hapless omega and then an alpha physically reminding an uppity beta their place in the pack. Perhaps the whelp was only poor at expressing himself, but no self-respecting inu bitch would remained with a partner so free with verbal abuse. An alpha? Yes, but partners mated as equals. No omega would mate an alpha and a female alpha with a beta suitor would soon find that suitor in fleshy ribbons should they be seeking a permanent alliance. But human relations were bizarre, so perhaps that was acceptable or even expected behavior. "And our collaboration on this venture has been a little rough. Even though you are Lord of the West, you overstepped your bounds as an outsider when you tried to interfere in our pack politics."

She took a deep breath. "But I was in the wrong as well, when I insulted your pack. For loyalty and devotion, nowhere in Japan would be able to find such followers as yours."

Sesshomaru tilted his head slightly in acceptance of her apology. "Your point?" he prompted.

"I want to help you," she told him earnestly, body shifting forward as her underdeveloped human body language pleased with him to understand the degree of that desire, which was somewhat surprising given her recent assessment of their relationship. "But I don't know how this will work. If I behave as if you were my alpha, that might create a bond between us, but as alpha, if you go mad, your madness has the possibility of spreading through the pack."

Sesshomaru regarded her evenly, while internally acknowledging that for truth. "You could prevent your shiki from acting on their madness, but you would not be able to prevent them from being exposed to this one," he agreed.

Unhappiness radiating from her in a bitter wash of scent. "Yes. They would truly become little more than puppets. And, no matter what happens to Rin and how much guilt I'll have to bear for my part in that, you understand that I cannot allow you to do that to Aki or Sei."

Sesshomaru's eyes narrowed and he felt his ire beginning to rise. "They are shiki. Slaves. Property. They do not follow you by choice. I will allow your comment to pass unchallenged because of Kuroren, but do not compare the worth of shiki to that of Rin."

Kagome visibly bit back angry words, fists clenching. "Very well. Then what is your suggestion, Sesshomaru? I know that there exists a risk for them to catch the madness from the source, but to further endanger them by exposing them to you through the bond of pack..."

"Your fears are pointless. We'll enter into a bloodsworn alliance."

Kagome blinked, her gaze turning thoughtful. "An alliance? But humans can't be held to their oaths in the same way that youkai can. Is it even possible?"

"It will be," Sesshomaru replied. _Impossible for a human, yes, but not for an immortal, even if you are not youkai. This one wasn't certain until we shared a futon, but there isn't even a lingering scent marker. You are no longer human, Higurashi Kagome. _"Send for writing supplies. We'll draw up the contract before we leave this chamber."

-I-I-I-

After a helpful but bemused inu youkai had brought the requested items and Kagome had dressed, Sesshomaru had ordered her to seal the room. And then the negotiation had begun.

It was tedious work, but frightening as well, for while they entered into the contract as equals, into what was really just formalized friendship and a hazy promise of mutual aid, what unsettled her was the madness clause. The Western Lands, in the event of temporary inability to fulfill his duties, reverted to a regency, the power managed by his mother and uncle. Sesshomaru himself was entrusted to her keeping. If he reverted fully to bestial instincts, he was to become her shiki in all but name, with the expectation that she would restore him to himself with all due haste.

Kagome sincerely hoped that it would not come to that, but she was also curious, as she released the seal, how Sesshomaru, who'd been distant and formal throughout the proceedings, would choose to build a packbond between the two of them. Even when they'd pressed their thumbs onto the paper, wet with their own blood, and watched as a flicker of light illuminated the characters written in black ink, turning them all to deepest red, Sesshomaru had not looked as if he was making preparation for a coming mental break-down.

He might as well have been negotiating the price of a bolt of cloth, for all the expression he'd displayed. She'd watched him carefully, not just his face, but his hands, his ears, his body. There'd been nothing but the impassive resolution, making it harder than ever to believe that Sesshomaru was suffering at all.

He certainly didn't look happy as he drew nearer to her, sighing almost inaudibly as he buried his nose in her hair, stooping to accommodate the difference in their height. Kagome shivered, for the action felt far more intimate than when Nori-sama had done much the same thing. Her mind knew this was because she associated Sesshomaru with her old life, where this truly would have been a baffling gesture. But her body could only process sensation: the slight warmth of Sesshomaru's breath, the remarkable smoothness of the skin pressed against her cheek, and the scent that her companion exuded.

It was a vibrant but not overwhelming scent, so much so that it almost became a visceral memory of taste, of biting into fresh grapes. Firm, sweet flesh parting between white teeth, chilled and startling and delicious. A summer scent. As she had expected an altogether sharper and less pleasant scent, she knew Sesshomaru would sense both surprise and pleasure from her. And she knew, from broaching the subject with Kuroren, what kind of scent Sesshomaru would be smelling.

Purity, which to Kuroren's nose smelt of freshly sharpened steel and ozone, like the moment after lightning struck. It wasn't exactly the perfume she would have chosen as a teenager in Tokyo, but she supposed there were far worse scents. Kuroren seemed to find it appealing, so perhaps Sesshomaru would as well. That would be a great stride forward in their relationship, as vision was secondary to scent in the deepest instincts of an inu youkai.

Though he lingered longer than she was really comfortable with, she allowed Sesshomaru to be the one to pull away. He looked thoughtful, so Kagome took that as a positive sign. "Your scent is acceptable," he allowed.

"Thank you," she said, trying not to roll her eyes. Then she squared her shoulders, the time for rest finished. "Well, as enlightening as our time here was, it'll be best if we leave now. Before I have to fulfill my end of that contract."

Sesshomaru snorted softly and took his leave quite abruptly. The hall was empty when Kagome ventured into it, so she assumed that he'd retreated somewhere to wait impatiently for the others, to reappear at his own convenience.

Opening her senses, Kagome "called" softly for her shiki, a soft push of awareness that as unobtrusive as she could manage. Like a text message to her friends, telling them when and where to meet. It was ruder than a text message, but Nori-sama's message had left her with an even greater sense of urgency and her two shiki weren't awaiting her emergence patiently in the hall. Sei seemed to be at the peak of the mountain and Aki was several levels below Kagome, apparently frolicking in someone's kimono collection if the impression she'd received was accurate. She really hoped he didn't appropriate anything truly valuable or noticeable. Asking him not to appropriate anything at all was a hopeless campaign that always inspired long speeches on how an obi had pleaded with him to be taken away from a woman who wasn't allowing it to live up to its full potential.

Walking briskly toward where she could sense the remainder of the group, she was unsurprised when Kuroren materialized from the shadows and joined her. "Was your meeting with Tadashinori-sama fruitful, Higurashi-sama?" he inquired.

Kagome nodded grimly and explained what had transpired. "We mustn't let the others know about Sesshomaru," she murmured. "Inuyasha would complicate things. He can't help himself. And Sango-she has to look out for the welfare of the children."

"Pack business, then," Kuroren agreed. "If it became known that the Lord of the West was vulnerable-."

"It wouldn't simply be a matter of hunting down some ghosts. We'd be facing the reality of a war."

She found the others in a kind of long receiving hall, Inuyasha lounging moodily on the floor as the others formed a loose circle, Sango explaining to one of her young charges something involving their weapon. The conversation ceased as Kagome crossed the threshold.

"Finally," Inuyasha grumbled. "Thought you were still making googly eyes at the old dog." He pitched his voice to a high falsetto. "O, this lowly Kagome is your humble servant, Tadashinori-_sama, _please, let's make pretentious small talk while someone's _life _is at stake." He wrinkled up his nose as she marched over to him. "Kami, you stink like him. I hope you at least learned something useful."

"Yeah," Kagome told him dryly. "That you have absolutely no idea how life in a court functions. His mother could have been on fire in the next room and I in possession of the only bucket of water in a hundred miles and we'd probably still make some 'pretentious small talk.' Well," she relented, "maybe not, but the point is, Inuyasha, we can't just barge into his mountain and demand information."

"Says who?" Inuyasha replied mulishly. "I ain't in the mood for a lecture, Kagome. Did he tell ya anything useful?"

It was very tempting to withhold the information from Inuyasha, but she'd seen how he'd sat bolt upright as she entered and even now his fingers were clenched in his firerat hakama. He was truly worried for Rin and that worry erased what few manners he had. She'd seen it a thousand times, though usually it was in her defense. So she softened toward him, giving him and the others the edited information Nori-sama had shared.

Miroku looked thoughtful. "'Tis our lot in life to continue saving Japan it seems," he said with some humor. "Do you think it's a result of good karma or bad karma?"

Sango rolled her eyes. "Definitely bad karma. So, Kagome-chan, what do you think? What's our next move?"

Kagome shrugged helplessly, a very modern gesture. "Well, we know what's causing it now, in a sort of vague way, but we aren't any closer to finding _where _this parade originates from. Saying it's to the northeast encompasses too much territory for us to search quickly."

"You might be wrong about that," Miroku mused. "Tadashinori-sama mentioned something about the spirits having entered as if through a kimon, correct? That they'd been expelled?"

Kagome nodded.

"Then our task might be easier than you think. Something this powerful must have taken a truly extraordinary effort to exorcise. And if they've come back, the exorcism wasn't completely successful. What we're looking for is a sealing site that's been recently disturbed. And if they have the power to create this kind of a commotion, it won't be something simple and easily overlooked. Something large, something elaborate. But, if a youkai seems to think the spirits are old, the surface markers might have eroded..." Miroku looked to be speaking more to himself than to them now, likely plundering his memory for locations.

While he was mulling it over, Sei silently joined them, appearing at her left shoulder, but Aki flounced into the room with a flourish. "Kagome-sa-ma," he purred, neatly shouldering Kuroren to the side and linking his arm with hers, curling around her body. Whatever he'd been about to say was derailed as he inhaled more deeply, then he grinned toothily. His tone became sly in a different way, but at least he whispered his next teasing words into her ear rather than to the room at large. "Kagome-sama. I know bitches who would have gnawed off their right paw to exchange scent greetings with Sesshomaru, but you smell as if you've been sharing space with both the Lord of the West and the Mountain King Beneath the Moon. I didn't expect Tadashinori himself would join you, but it seems that he was curious about his sister's little human after all. And the inu say kitsune are nosy."

Kagome swatted at the clingy fox, but he didn't release her, chuckling instead. "What _I'm _curious about is Sesshomaru-that's a coup I don't think any bitch except his mother can boast of."

"_If _I tell you anything," Kagome hissed, "it certainly won't be here. And how can you think that's the most important thing here?"

Aki's face contorted and he made a _Tch _noise. "Society is always in danger. Sesshomaru hasn't had a packmate in five hundred years. Which do _you_ think is more interesting?"

Put in that perspective, Kagome supposed that made sense, but the fact remained that there _were _lives to be saved and that had to be put above gossiping with the enormously old, very powerful kitsune who had the mentality of a pushy teenage girl. Kagome glared at her shiki askance and he pouted, but he did keep quiet.

She found Miroku staring at her, more serious than was usual. "Osorezan," he told her, words firm and confident. "If there is a space in the northeast from whence unsettled spirits capable of inspiring madness might come, it's there."

Kagome cursed herself for overlooking the obvious. Osorezan was well known as a sacred area, Sanzu no Kawa being the river that all souls had to cross to enter the afterlife. "So, to Bodaiji Temple then?"

"The monks there will probably be able to offer us assistance," Miroku agreed. "Though if it has grown as bad as rumors suggest, we might be discovered before we even come close to the site."

Aki tugged irritably at her sleeve as the others began to stand, preparing to leave, Inuyasha urging them on. "What?" she demanded of him dryly.

"The scent of sulfur is terrible in silk," he whined. "We'll never get it out."

-I-I-I-

Sesshomaru felt a great sense of satisfaction at having a destination in mind, though Mt. Iwaki was some distance from Osorezan. Having consulted his uncle's maps briefly, they had decided that there were enough youkai members in their party to travel northward and then cross the Tairadate Straits, risking attack by dragon rather than skirting Aomori Bay and Mutsu Bay, which would have added at least a day to their journey. As it was, they would likely cross the strait by night, so their airborne travel would be less likely to be noticed by ningen, then camp on the far shore and make the next leg of the journey in daylight.

Rather begrudgingly, he kept pace with the others, but his eyes were on the sky. Beyond the bulwark of the Great Court of the Moon, everything was contested territory. Their destination, in fact, was well within the ryuu-controlled zone, though now that he no longer had to deal with the internal threat that Naraku and the Jewel represented, that would soon change.

Kuroren too had surrendered his charge to the miko's ryuu, preferring instead to keep both hands free in case of attack. Kagome didn't seem much bothered by the switch, perched comfortably in the crook of the dragon's arm, feet dangling daintily. She felt his attention on her and turned her head, smiling when she saw he wasn't in need of anything.

Sei glanced over at him curiously, then returned his attention to the landscape ahead, though he was already moving so smoothly over the terrain that Kagome's body barely shifted though her bangs were being whipped by the wind. Leaping suddenly into the air, Sesshomaru landed in step beside the pair.

Kagome looked startled for a moment. "Is something wrong, Sesshomaru-sama?" she inquired, dark brows furrowing.

He gave her a speaking look and she blushed. "My apologies," she said. "I was expecting a more half-hearted approach to this."

Sesshomaru would have agreed with her, except it would entail admitting that he quite frankly didn't know how to develop the smooth personal interaction he could observe between her and her pack. He doubted their relationship had automatically assumed the impressive _we _and _them _mentality. So approaching it without some ambition would be the same as not progressing at all. "Mi-Kagome-san, you are not worried about your ryuu's loyalty?"

Kagome was perplexed by his question. "Sei? Why would Sei-?" It took her a moment for her to even consider to whom he would betray her and Sesshomaru's estimation of both her unwavering loyalty and willfully naive worldview rose. "You think Sei would turn against me for other dragons?"

Even Sei himself looked a bit perplexed. "With all respect, Sesshomaru-sama, there have been far better opportunities to eat Kagome-sama than in the midst of her allies."

"See?"

"This one sincerely hopes that the fullness of your confidence in your allies does not rest wholly in your continued uneaten state."

"I don't know," she replied breezily, "considering the nature of my allies, I think it's a fairly good standard for how well things are going."

A/N: Fun fact: Osoresan, so I'm told, literally translates as "Fear Mountain."


End file.
